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sf ■ VALOR 

Irue Siories 
of the Great War 

With Introduction by 

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SNAPSHOTS 
OF VALOR 

Edited by HERBERT ELLIOT 



With an Introduction by 

IAN HAY 






New York 

GROSSET & DUNLAP 

Publishers 



y 
**># 



Copyright, 1918, by 
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 

All rights reserved, including that of 

translation into foreign languages, 

including the Scandinavian 



OUL ~0 lb 10 



©CU5U1055 



INTRODUCTION 

In responding to the Editor's invitation to in- 
troduce this volume to its readers, it occurs to .me 
that in these days the reading public (or the world, 
if you like), is divided into two sections — those 
who are participating in the actual conflict of 
War, and those who are only able to read about it. 
These must approach such a book as this from 
different points of view. 

The civilian will say, quite simply: — "Here 
are tales to stir our pulses and make us feel glad 
and proud that we are of the same blood with the 
men who did these things." He will add, pos- 
sibly in a voice not quite so steady as usual: — 
"Some of us are debarred, by age or sex, from 
direct service; but we will gather further courage 
from this record of heroism to do that in this War 
which falls within our province. In future, 
whether our part be hard manual labor, or 
cheerful giving, or the mere tightening of a belt, 



vi INTRODUCTION 

we shall play that part with hearts all the higher 
and spirits all the sterner for the remembrance 
of this tale which has been told us." 

Thus the civilian. The soldier's attitude is 
more complex. Naturally he feels a little self- 
conscious in the matter, especially if he has some 
great achievement to his credit. He will say: 
"We are all very proud to have been able to do 
anything at all, and very humble to have been 
able to do so little. So don't exaggerate individual 
achievements, please. After all, it is team-work 
that counts.' ' 

Which is nothing but the truth. 

Many people object to military decorations — 
crosses, medals, ribbons, and the like — on the 
ground that they draw invidious distinctions. 
Not that the decorations are undeserved: in most 
cases they are earned over and over again. But 
all soldiers will tell you that the winning of a 
decoration is a sheer matter of luck. " Some one 
happened to be looking at the time; that is all." 

From this point of view, such a collection of 
tales as this must necessarily be incomplete. It 
comprises only deeds which were done when 



INTRODUCTION vii 

"some one was looking.' ' The bravest of all 
must go unrecorded. I say "bravest of all," 
because the gallantry of an action varies inversely, 
in the main, with its prospects of recognition 
hereafter. It is comparatively easy to volunteer 
for a forlorn hope; to stagger across No Man's 
Land under fire, carrying a wounded comrade; 
even to throw oneself on a live grenade (as many 
a man has done in the trenches) in order to save^ 
the lives of those around. Live or die, win or lose., 
your achievement is recorded. But what of that 
courage which manifests itself when no one is 
going to know anything about it afterward? 
Many an isolated handful of leaderless soldiers 
have to decide in these days, suddenly and with- 
out previous thought, between justifiable retire- 
ment from an untenable position and a deliberate 
sacrifice of self which may or may not delay the 
enemy's advance for ten minutes — knowing full 
well that if they choose to stand fast their 
achievement must be its own reward, and that 
their names will be blazoned in no public print 
save under the heading, "Missing." Those are 
the deeds that cannot be told in a collection of 



viii INTRODUCTION 

true tales, for the simple reason that no one ever 
saw them done. But they are being done every 
day, as the soldier — especially the decorated soldier 
— will tell you. 

So let us who read this book, even as we tingle 
and thrill over the deeds here recorded, spare a 
thought for those nameless paladins who have 
gone down into silence without any memorial, 
at no other bidding but that of simple duty — 
" Gentlemen, unafraid." 

Ian Hay. 



EDITOR'S NOTE 

The whole field of the war has been surveyed 
in recording these "Snapshots of Valor." They 
are not confined to any one section of the arena 
of conflict, nor to one nationality. They could 
not well be so restricted, since courage, fortitude, 
and self-sacrifice are not qualities to be classified 
according to race or clime, but are inherent to 
mankind itself. 

On the sea and land, over the land and sea — 
wherever the Teuton has goaded Anglo-Saxon, 
Slav, and Latin to try conclusions with him, tense 
dramas of life and death have been enacted. A 
comprehensive selection of these episodes has 
been made in the accompanying pages. They 
are rather intended to be representative in 
their scope, furnishing thrilling examples of the 
manner in which men acquit themselves in great 
crises; of the heights and depths of human bravery 
performed in moments of fearful stress — and hence 



x EDITOR'S NOTE 

may be deemed as typical of the unknown deeds 
that will never be recorded. 

A study of these episodes here and there discloses 
the mental attitude of the participants as they 
confront the emergency which compels them to 
essay an achievement or set their teeth to endure 
an ordeal they cannot escape. The impression 
one gathers is that they are not aware of under- 
taking anything of a signal or untoward character. 
Something presents itself to be done, and it is 
done. That is all. 

This spirit of men fitting themselves to occa- 
sions as they arose animated them all. 

The hero emerges after the event. The laurel 
crowns him. But during his great moment he is 
only a worker attending to some task which 
confronts him. 

The editor gathered the material for this book 
from many sources. Many tales came from the 
mouths of participants; others were told by eye 
witnesses; all are believed to be authentic. 

Herbert Elliot. 



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 

The publishers acknowledge their indebtedness to the 
following newspapers and periodical publications for the 
source of some of the material in this volume: London 
Morning Post, London Telegraph, New York Evening Post, 
New York Evening Sun, New York Globe, New York 
Herald, New York Times, New York Tribune, New York 
World, American Magazine, Current History, Current Opin- 
ion, Literary Digest, Literary Gazette, Manchester Guardian 
New York Herald War Magazine, New York Times 
Current History, New York World Magazine, Outlook, Pall 
Mall Gazette, Saturday Evening Post. 

Also to the following book publishers who have allowed 
us to use extracts from their publications: D. Appleton 
& Co., Cassell & Co., The Century Co., Chapman &Hall, 
George H. Doran Co., William Heinemann, Hodder & 
Stoughton, Houghton Mifflin Co., John Lane Co., 
McBride, Nast & Co., John Murray, Chas. Scribner's 
Sons, Small, Maynard & Co., Frederick A. Stokes & Co. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Introduction v 

Editor's Note ix 

A Summer Joy Ride 3 

The Bandsmen Led the Charge .... 13 

An Iron Cross on a British Breast ... 15 

Their Captor Was a Girl 17 

A Few Aerial Thrills 20 

A Coal Shovel Blinded This Submarine . . 26 

A Canadian Trapper's Camouflage ... 29 

Airplane Captures a Trench 33 

Digging Trenches Under Fire 35 

Lone Australian Stormed a Trench ... 41 

Babes Unscathed Amid Gunfire .... 45 

The Man Behind the Dude 47 

Six Germans Fell Before this American . . 57 

Blew Up His Hydroplane and Himself. . 60 

A One-legged Hero of Italy 63 

Three Days in a Shell Hole 70 

xii 



CONTENTS xiii 

Picks, Shovels, and Clasp Knives . ... 77 



Rejected as a Prisoner of War .... 
With One Gun Silenced a German Battery 
Both Foes in a Fiery Embrace . 
A Three-minute Trench Raid .... 
Balked the Enemy at Their Funeral Pyre 
A Charlie Chaplin Gait and a Top Hat 

Carried the Trench 

Just American Fortitude 

Fell to Earth — Rescued — Aloft Again 
The U-Boat That Escaped a Trap . . 
Only Half a Cow Was There .... 
Capturing a Submarine Single-handed . 
Fliers Must also Be Fleet Footed . . . 

Saved His Foe's Wife 

Safe Under an Exploding Mine . 
Huns Fought One Another in Mid-air . 
An Italian Raid into Austrian Waters . 
An Austrian Raid into Italian Waters . 
From One Living Tomb to Another . 
A German Attack — And the Heart in a Tree 
The Raid on German Headquarters . 

Shelled in and Shelled out 

How a Motor Car Trapped a Zeppelin . 



81 
84 
9i 
93 
97 

100 

105 
107 

no 

118 

120 

126 

130 

137 

143 
148 

155 

159 
161 
166 
171 
173 



xiv CONTENTS 

Rushing the Wounded Through Gas and 

Shell-fire l8 ° 

Alone on a Raft i 8 3 

How Rockwell Died 189 

Lay in Wait for the Convoy . . . . .200 

The Battle in the Wood 203 

Head-on Collision Under Water .... 209 

Beer, Blood, Boches, and Bottles .... 210 

A Tight Corner 5 211 

Cool Amid Flames 219 

Submarine v. Submarine— A Three-minute 

Fight 222 

Caught the U-Boat Napping 225 

Facing a Gas Attack 227 

Submarine Crew Swam in Oil . . . . 232 

A Tower the Germans Built too Well . . 233 

The Merchantman Won 239 

How the Snow Trapped a German Battalion 243 

Drove Into His Foe in Mid-air .... 249 

Fate of the Flame Throwers 251 

Bombing From an Armored Car . . . . 254 

They Fell, but the Fuse Was Lighted . . . 261 

The Baptism of Lead 263 

In a French Cottage . 267 



CONTENTS xv 

I 

The Solitary Gunner Broke the Column . 269 

The Message That Saved a Regiment . . 272 

His Captor Was Missing 274 

Rode Through Lyddite and Melinite . . 275 
Twenty-six British Fought Three Thousand 

Five Hundred Germans 277 

A Tub Fortress Overcame the Uhlans . . 280 

Friend and Foe Bombed This Lone Soldier. 283 

Saving a Wounded Man and a Gun . . . 285 

The First American Shot 292 

The Rescue From the Deep 295 

How a Stowaway Bested the Court-martial . 297 

The Charge of the Dead . . . . . . 299 

Not Dead, But Dead-drunk 303 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

The U-Boat the U. S. S. Fanning Got . . 

Frontispiece 

FACING PAGE 

Mounting a Plane of the Stork Escadrille . 32 

Modern Grenadiers 80 

One of Guynemer's Conquests 144 

First Aid in the Trenches Under Fire . . 176 

The Anzacs Landing on Gallipoli Under 

Fire 208 

The British Submarine that Penetrated 

the Dardanelles 240 

The Rescue of a Tommy by a Poilu . . 288 



XVI 



SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 



SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

A SUMMER JOY RIDE 

FOUR British airships, each complete with 
pilot, observer, and several hundred rounds 
of ammunition, set out one August after- 
noon on an offensive patrol. Captain Alan Bott, 
in " Cavalry of the Clouds/ ' whose part in the ad- 
venture is herewith related, said they were to hunt 
trouble around a given area behind the Boche lines. 
It was on the Somme front. While over 
Bapaume the presence there of a hotbed of German 
anti-aircraft guns caused the party to swerve 
toward the south. But the "Archibalds" — the 
name given to the German guns — were not to be 
shaken off so easily, and the airmen began a 
series of erratic deviations as black puffs ringed 
one machine, then another. The shooting was 
not particularly good; for, although no clouds 
intervened between the guns and their mark, a 



4 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

powerful sun dazzled the gunners, who appeared 
to find difficulty in judging height and direction. 
The party was presently over the Bois d'Havrin 
court, the region round which was notorious in 
Royal Flying Corps messes as being the chief 
centre of the Boche Flying Corps on the British 
front. From the southwest corner " Archie " 
again scattered shot at the group, but his inaccu- 
racy made dodging hardly necessary. A lull 
followed, and Captain Bott, who was an observer 
in one of the machines, glanced all round the com- 
pass, for, in the presence of hostile airplanes 
"Archie" seldom behaved except when friendly 
machines were about. Two thousand feet below 
three biplanes were observed approaching the 
wood from the south. Black crosses showed up 
plainly on their gray-white wings. The British 
group dropped into a dive toward the strangers. 

"As we dived/' writes Captain Bott, "I esti- 
mated the angle at which we might cross the 
Boche trio, watched for a change of direction on 
their part, slewed round the gun-mounting to the 
most effective setting for what would probably be 
my arc of fire, and fingered the movable back- 



A SUMMER JOY RIDE 5 

sight. At first the Huns held to their course as 
if quite unconcerned. Later they began to lose 
height. Their downward line of flight became 
steeper and steeper, and so did ours. 

"Just as our leading bus (airship) arrived within 
range and began to spit bullets through the 
propeller, a signal rocket streaked from the first 
Boche biplane, and the trio dived almost vertically. 
We were then at about 6,000 feet. 

"We were expecting to see the Huns flatten 
out, when 'WoufT! woufT! woufT! woufT! woufT !' 
said Archie. The German birds were not hawks 
at all; they were merely tame decoys used to entice 
us to a pre-arranged spot, at a height well favored 
for A.-A. gunners. The ugly puffs encircled us, 
and it seemed unlikely that an airplane could get 
away without being caught in a patch of hurtling 
high explosive. Yet nobody was hit. ... 

"Mingled with the many black bursts were a 
few green ones, probably gas shells, for Archie had 
begun to experiment with the gas habit. Very 
suddenly a line of fiery rectangles shot up and 
curved toward us when they had reached three 
quarters of their maximum height. They rose 



6 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

and fell within thirty yards of our tail. These 
were c onions/ the flaming rockets which the Boche 
keeps for any hostile aircraft that can be lured 
to a height of between 4,000 and 5,000 feet. 

"I yelled to V , my pilot, that we should 

have to dodge. We side-slipped and swerved 
to the left. A minute later the stream of ' onions' 
had disappeared, greatly to my relief, for the 
prospect of a fire in the air inspires in me a mortal 
funk. Soon we were to pass from the unpleasant 
possibility to a far more unpleasant reality. 

" Once outside the unhealthy region we climbed 
to a less dangerous height. Again we became 
the target for a few dozen H.-E. (high-explosive) 
shells. We broke away and swooped downward. 
Some little distance ahead, and not far below, 

was a group of five Albatross two-seaters. V 

pointed our machine at them, in the wake of the 
flight-commander's bus. 

"Next instant the fuselage shivered. I looked 
along the inside of it and found that a burning 
shell fragment was lodged in a longeron, halfway 
between my cockpit and the tail-plane. A little 
flame zigzagged over the fabric, and all but died 



A SUMMER JOY RIDE 7 

away, but, being fanned with the wind as we 
lost height, recovered and licked its way toward 
the tail. I was too far away to reach the flame 
with my hands, and the fire extinguisher was by 
the pilot's seat. I called for it, into the speaking 
tube. The pilot made no move. Once more I 

shouted. Again no answer! V 's ear-piece 

had slipped from under his cap. A thrill of acute 
fear passed through me as I stood up, forced 
my arm through the rush of wind, and grabbed 
V 's shoulder. 

" 'Fuselage burning ! Pass the fire extinguisher ! ' 
I yelled. 

"My words were drowned in the engine's roar; 
and the pilot, intent on getting near the Boches, 
thought I had asked which one we were to attack. 

'"Look out for those two Huns on the left/ he 
called over his shoulder. 

'"Pass the fire extinguisher!' 

"'Get ready to shoot, blast you!' 

'"Fire extinguisher, you ruddy fool!' 

"A backward glance told me that the fire was 
nearing the tail-plane at the one end and my box 
of ammunition on the other, and was too serious 



8 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

for treatment by the extinguisher unless I oould 
get it at once. Desperately I tried to force myself 
through the bracing-struts and cross-wires behind 
my seat. To my surprise, head and shoulders 
and one arm got to the other side — a curious cir- 
cumstance, as afterward I tried several times to 
repeat this contortionist trick on the ground, but 
failed every time. There I stuck, for it was im- 
possible to wriggle farther. However, I could 
now reach part of the fire, and at it I beat with 
gloved hands. Within half a minute most of 
the fire was crushed to death. But a thin streak 
of flame, outside the radius of my arm, still flick- 
ered toward the tail. I tore off one of my gaunt- 
lets and swung it furiously on to the burning strip. 
The flame lessened, rose again when I raised the 
glove, but died out altogether after I had hit it 
twice. The load of fear left me, and I discovered 
an intense discomfort, wedged in as I was between 
the two crossed bracing-struts. Five minutes 
passed before I was able, with many a heave and 
gasp, to withdraw back to my seat. 

"By now we were at close grips with the enemy 
and our machine and another converged on a Hun. 



A SUMMER JOY RIDE 9 

V was firing industriously. As we turned, he 

glared at me, and knowing nothing of the fire, 
shouted: 'Why the hell haven't you fired yet?' 

"I caught sight of a Boche bus below us, aimed 
at it, and emptied a drum in short bursts. It 
swept away, but not before two of the German 
observer's bullets had plugged our petrol tank 
from underneath. The pressure went and with 
it our petrol supply. The needle on the rev.- 
counter quivered to the left as the revolutions 
dropped, and the engine missed on first one, then 

two cylinders. V turned us round, and, with 

nose down, headed the machine for the trenches. 
Just then the engine ceased work altogether, and 
we began to slide down. 

"All this happened so quickly that I had scarcely 
realized our plight. Next I began to calculate 
our chances of reaching the lines before we would 
have to land. Our height was 9,000 feet, and 
we were just over nine and a half miles from 
friendly territory. Reckoning the gliding possi- 
bilities of our type of bus as a mile to a thousand 
feet, the odds seemed unfavorable. 

"Could we do it? I prayed to the gods and 



io SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

trusted to the pilot. Through my mind there 
flitted impossible plans to be tried if we landed 
in Boche territory. 

' l WoufT ! WoufT ! Archie was complicating the 
odds. 

"Further broodings were checked by the sudden 
appearance of a German scout. Taking advan- 
tage of our plight, the pilot dived steeply from a 
point slightly behind us. We could not afford 

to lose any distance by dodging, so V did 

the only thing possible — he kept straight on. 
I raised my gun, aimed at the wicked-looking 
nose of the attacking craft, and met it with a 
barrage of bullets. These must have worried 
the Boche, for he swerved aside when a hundred 
and fifty yards distant, and did not flatten out 
until he was beneath the tail of our machine. 
Afterward he climbed away from us, turned, and 
dived once more. For a second time we escaped, 
owing either to some lucky shots from my gun or 
to the lack of judgment by the Hun pilot. The 
scout pulled up and passed ahead of us. It 
rose and manoeuvred as if to dive from the front 
and bar the way. 



A SUMMER JOY RIDE n 

"Meanwhile, four specks, approaching from the 
west, had grown larger and larger, until they were 
revealed to us as of the F.E. type — the British 
' pusher' two-seater. The Boche saw them, and 
hesitated, as they bore down on him. Finding 
himself in the position of a Hon attacked by hunters 
when about to pounce on a tethered goat, he de- 
cided not to destroy, for in so doing he would have 
laid himself open to destruction. When I last 
saw him he was racing northeast. 

"There was now no obstacle to the long glide. 
As we went lower, the torn ground showed up 
plainly. From 2,000 feet I could almost count the 
shell holes. Two battery positions came into 
view, and near one of them I saw tracks and could 
distinguish movements by a few tiny dots. It 
became evident that, barring accident, we should 
reach the French zone. 

"When slightly behind the trenches a confused 
chatter from below told us that machine guns were 
trained on the machine. By way of retaliation, I 
leaned over and shot at what looked like an em- 
placement. Then came the Boche front line, rag- 
ged and unkempt. I fired along an open trench. 



12 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

f . 

"Although far from fearless as a rule, I was not 
in the least afraid during the eventful glide. 
My state of intense 'wind up' while the fuse was 
burning had apparently exhausted my stock of 
nervousness. I seemed detached from all idea of 
danger, and the desolated trench area might 
have been a side show at a fair." 

The machine finally landed without a wire being 
broken, but, needless to say, it had not escaped 
unscathed: 

"An examination of the bus revealed a fair crop 
of bullet holes through the wings and elevator. 
A large gap in one side of the fuselage, over a 
longeron that was charred to powder in parts, 
bore witness to the fire. Petrol was dripping 
from the spot where the tank had been perforated. 
On taking a tin of chocolate from his pocket, 

V found it ripped and gaping. He searched 

the pocket and discovered a bright bullet at the 
bottom. We traced the adventures of that bullet; 
it had grazed a strut, cut right through the petrol 
union, and expended itself on the chocolate tin." 



THE BANDSMEN LED THE CHARGE 

IT WAS at Vauquois that an incident happened 
which — in the view of Camille Decreus, the 
French composer, who described it — stands 
alone in the great war. 

A regimental band charged at the head of troops. 
Nowadays bands are usually kept in the rear. 
But a critical moment came. The French had 
three times attacked the Germans and had thrice 
been repulsed. The colonel felt that a time for 
supreme effort had arrived. He summoned the 
leader of the band. 

"Put your men at the head of the regiment, 
strike up the i Marseillaise ' and lead them to 
victory," he commanded. 

The bandmaster saluted. He called his mu- 
sicians and told them what was expected. Then 
the forty of them took their positions. The 
French line re-formed. The bandmaster waved 
his baton. 

"Allons, Enfants de la Patrie!" rang out, and 
13 



i 4 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

the men took up the song. France was calling 
on them to do or die. The band started out 
on the double quick, as if on rapid parade. The 
Germans must have rubbed their eyes. No 
musician carried a weapon. But they were 
carrying the "Marseillaise" against the foe. 
Then came the continuous rattle of the machine 
guns. The band marched on, their ranks thinning 
at every step. The leader went down. The 
cornetist followed him. The drummers and their 
instruments collapsed in the same. volley. In less 
than five minutes every man of the forty was lying 
upon the ground, killed or wounded; that is — with 
one exception. That was a trombone player. 

His whole instrument was shot away except 
the mouthpiece and the slide to which his fingers 
were fastened. He did not know it. He still 
blew and worked the slide. It was only a ghostly 
"Marseillaise" he was playing, but the spirits 
of his dead comrades played with him, and at the 
head of the regiment, and with that fragment 
of a trombone, he led the way to victory. 

The trench was taken. Half of the band had 
died on the field of honor. 



AN IRON CROSS ON A BRITISH BREAST 

DURING one fierce engagement a British 
officer saw a German officer impaled on 
a barbed wire, writhing in anguish. The 
fire was dreadful, yet he still hung there un- 
scathed. 

At length the British officer could stand it no 
longer. He said quietly: "I can't bear to look 
at that poor chap any longer.' ' 

So he went out under the hail of shell, released 
him, took him on his shoulders, and carried him to 
the German trench. 

The firing ceased. Both sides watched the 
act with wonder. Then the commander in the 
German trench came forward, took from his own 
bosom the Iron Cross and pinned it on the breast 
of the British officer. 

" Such an episode is true to the holiest ideals of 
chivalry," remarks Coningsby Dawson, who de- 

xs 



16 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

scribed the incident in "Carry On"*; and it is all 
the more welcome because the German record is 
stained by so many acts of barbarism which the 
world cannot forgive. 



♦Published by the John Lane Company. 



THEIR CAPTOR WAS A GIRL 

A MONG a party of Letts who succeeded in 
/\ escaping from a village in Courland, now 
-*- ^ occupied by the Germans, was a girl of 
seventeen, who became a heroine by an act of 
bravery which earned for her the much-coveted 
Russian decoration of the St. George's Cross. 

A small German detachment had marched on to 
the farm owned by the girl's father. Sentries 
were left outside to keep watch on a hill close by 
while the rest entered the house and prepared to 
have a good time. The young German lieu tenant 
turned to the girl with an order to get wine at 
any cost as their supply had run short. She was 
told that unless she fulfilled the order the house 
would be set on fire and she herself subjected to 
violence. 

The girl obeyed, and while doing so acted upon 
a bright idea which struck her. Two barrels of 
heavy old liquor, made of spirits and berries, were 

17 



i% SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

in the cellar, and these she brought them. They 
■only emptied the first barrel, but before they 
•consumed the second one they began to roll on 
the floor, one after another. 

Seeing her enemies helpless round the barrel 
she filled a bowl with the liquor, took it out to the 
sentries, who stood freezing in the cold, and gave it 
to them to drink, incidentally mentioning that she 
was fulfilling the officer's orders. The bowl was 
soon emptied. She then returned to the house 
and carefully disarmed the soldiers who, sunk in 
heavy slumber, lay about in different attitudes, 
and hid their weapons in the cellar. Meantime, 
her father was fastening with ropes the limbs of 
the insensible Germans. 

The girl then proceeded to find her way out 
to the Russian positions. Following forest paths 
and making her way through swamps, she finally 
reached a Siberian outpost. 

"I have disarmed and tied up twenty German 
soldiers and one officer; hasten and take them 
prisoners! " were the words with which the excited 
girl addressed the head officer of the Siberian 
Rifles. 



THEIR CAPTOR WAS A GIRL 19 

The soldiers were amazed at the audacity of the 
young Lett and could hardly believe her story. 
Yet her device had been simple. She had drugged 
the liquor with powder made of bluebells which 
brought on heavy drowsiness. 

She persuaded the soldiers to follow her, and 
when they reached the farm they found the Ger- 
mans still fast locked in slumber. Several pails 
of ice-cold water flung in the faces of the sleepers 
roused them to the grim realities of their situation. 
To their bewilderment they found that they were 
no longer combatants of the German army but 
prisoners of the Russians. 



A FEW AERIAL THRILLS 

FIGHTING Germans armed with machine- 
and rapid-fire guns some 20,000 feet be- 
yond the breast of Mother Earth has 
been the experience of Lieutenant Edward M. 
Roberts, of the Royal Flying Corps, in common 
with other British aviators. It might well be 
deemed the most thrilling exploit an airman 
could undertake; but Lieutenant Roberts, describ- 
ing his performances to Edgeworth Downer in 
the New York World, finds that fighting to the 
death somewhere in the clouds is not so electric 
after all. He has encountered more ecstatic 
experiences. 

Lieutenant Roberts has been blown up by shells, 
shot out of the air three days hand running by 
German anti-aircraft guns, attacked by squadrons 
of Teuton flyers, wounded too often to contem- 
plate, and finally invalided home. 
When the war broke out, Roberts, an American 



A FEW AERIAL THRILLS 21 

by birth, was prospecting for oil in the Canadian 
wilds. He had spent the six preceding years of 
his life in the Dominion, punching cattle, mining 
for gold, living next to the primitive. 

One day in the fall of 191 4 he trudged into a 
little Indian town and picked up his first news- 
paper in three months. War had been declared, 
and the Germans were over-running Belgium. 
He made his way to Calgary, found a pal who told 
him 200 volunteers were wanted, and enlisted the 
same night. 

Roberts went into action in Flanders with the 
First Canadian Division and had the privilege of 
being gassed at the second battle of "Wipers." 
On recovery he was transferred to the Second 
Division as despatch rider, carrying orders to the 
front line on a motorcycle. Seven months later 
he was riding just behind the line in the northern 
salient when a great Jack Johnson shell from one 
of the German mortars hit the road fifty feet in 
front of his machine and exploded. At dawn the 
next day the despatch rider was found lying un- 
conscious on a near-by knoll where the explosion 
had thrown him. He had been thrown with 



22 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

such force that his left lung was torn out of place. 
He wonders still how he survived, but he did. 

Six weeks later he was back at his post, this 
time attached to the engineers. His pleasant 
duty was to haul supplies to the trench troops 
along a strip of road which was, for more than a 
mile, in plain sight of the enemy and under his 
fire. He had got well started when the Germans 
took the road under fire from machine guns. 
Roberts caught a bullet in the side. 

After his recovery from this wound, the Lieu- 
tenant entered the air service and duly encoun- 
tered a German flyer. He thus describod his 
first victory: 

"We were doing patrol over our lines and behind 
the enemy trenches when I saw a little spot away 
off in the sky. My pilot said it was a German. 

"The fellow came over and tackled us. As he 
rushed by, my pilot shouted 'Fire!' But the 
Boche was gone a mile. I thought if I had to 
shoot a man down going that fast I'd never get 
him. We both manoeuvred for position and 
came in side by side. I took aim with a Lewis 
gun. Just at that moment one of the German's 



A FEW AERIAL THRILLS 23 

bullets hit a strut about four inches from my 
face. I dodged instinctively and pulled the 
trigger at the same time. I could see my fire 
bullets hit the machine. He started to glide 
down to the ground. We followed him down a 
way to make sure he was gone. Then I sat 
down, feeling satisfied and excited. That was 
my first. 

"And the very next week we were out on a 
reconnaissance — two of us British machines — 
behind the German lines. About thirty miles 
behind the lines six Germans attacked us. We 
forced one to land. Then two of them tackled 
my machine at the same time. At the first brush 
my pilot was shot through the shoulder. Our 
machine tipped so that I came near being thrown 
out. I could see the blood oozing from his wound 
as we righted. One of the Germans then dived 
(the soldier always says 'dove') at us from 
behind. I took careful aim. When he came close 
enough I pulled the trigger. He went down. 
Meantime two French machines came over and 
joined us. They forced down two others. The 
other Germans were satisfied to leave us alone.' ' 



24 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

, Lieutenant Roberts experienced his greatest 
thrill, not in the war zone, but in sailing over 
London on a quiet, rainy day: 

"I'd gone up practising and trying out a ma- 
chine. After flying about a while I started to 
descend, when I discovered, on going through the 
clouds, that there was a rainstorm. I had petrol 
for a couple of hours, so decided to go back up 
and ride it out above the storm. The clouds 
were very high and peculiarly formed in layers 
and peaks. The earth was out of sight. I started 
to amuse myself at an elevation of about n,ooo 
feet by diving through the peaks of these clouds 
and coming out on the other side. 

"Fooling around, I dived into the peak of a 
cloud and the vapor closed round me. I lost all 
sense of balance. The machine dived down, 
started to flatten out, and turned into the glide 
at a speed of not less than 200 miles an hour. 
Just in this glide I came out of the dense peak 
into a thinner layer of cloud. I could see dimly 
about fifty feet. 

"Suddenly the dark round belly of a balloon 
was before me. By some instinctive movement 



A FEW AERIAL THRILLS 25 

of the rudder I swerved and passed by the balloon. 
The terrific disturbance of the air shook it so that 
it nearly threw two occupants out of the basket. 
It was the worst fright and the greatest thrill of 
the war for me. It was so utterly unlooked for, 
whereas fights with enemy machines are business. 
"The balloon? Oh, it was a weather balloon 
such as are sent up over London whenever it 



rains." 



This was his final aerial adventure: 
" I was driving a machine from England to the 
front in France when a connection broke, and the 
loose end tangled in the propeller. Everything 
broke and the engine was thrown back on my 
knees. I lost control of everything but the stick, 
and I couldn't do anything with that. I dropped 
like a shot from 10,000 feet. About 2,000 feet 
from the ground the machine started to flatten 
out a bit. I tried to glide down, and finally hit 
the earth gliding about 150 miles an hour. I 
ran into a hedge, still going seventy miles an hour, 
and finally was thrown clear of the machine. I 
was broken up once more, and at last I had to 
leave the service." 



A COAL SHOVEL BLINDED THIS 
SUBMARINE 

WHEN one's vessel is in danger from enemy 
submarines anything will do as a weapon 
of defence. The captain of a British 
trawler, for example, found a coal shovel useful. 
The trawler, according to the story told by one 
of the crew, was in the North Sea in a stiff breeze 
in February, 1918, when the skipper saw a peri- 
scope crawl through the breaking surface of the 
sea about a hundred yards off. There was no 
gun aboard and the trawler's best speed was 
less than eight knots. 

"For awhile the fight was fierce/' said the 
narrator. "Then for half an hour no shots were 
fired, while the submarine manoeuvred for posi- 
tion. Our ship was vibrating with speed. 
Our captain paced the bridge, keenly observant. 
When the U-boat finally got the position he wanted 

and renewed the shell fire, our gun crew decided 

26 



BLINDED THIS SUBMARINE 27 

to let them have it as hot as our gun would stand. 
After a few minutes we landed a shell squarely 
on the German's back. It apparently disturbed 
him a good deal, for he stopped firing at once, 
then slackened speed, altered course, and sub- 
merged. 

"It was a situation to dismay most men. 
Our skipper, however, has a righting spirit. A 
touch of the wheel sent the trawler's blunt bows 
pointing at the submarine's whaleback, and we 
wallowed menacingly toward the pirate. 

" The U-boat swung round to avoid the impact, 
and the sides of the trawler scraped along the 
sides of the submarine. The periscope was still 
well out of the water, but was beginning to slip 
down as the submarine dived. 

"The skipper bawled for a hammer, a crowbar 
— anything that would hurt. One of the crew 
thrust a coal shovel into his hand, and he scram- 
bled on the bulwarks and leaned over, two of the 
crew hanging on to his coat so that he wouldn't 
fall overboard. Backward and forward he swung 
the heavy scoop at the fragile periscope, and the 
third blow reduced it to fragments. 



28 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

"The submarine commander, hearing the noise 
and wondering what new and horrible device the 
enemy had invented, crept to his periscope to 
have a look, but all was black. He was blind, 
and the trawler got away in safety." 



A CANADIAN TRAPPER'S CAMOUFLAGE* 

SNIPERS — on both sides — along the western 
front, with No Man's Land yawning be- 
tween them, conceal themselves by all 
the tricks known to Red Indian warfare. The 
various disguises which trench camouflage give 
their surroundings are their chief aid. 

Will Irwin has cited what he considered the 
most ingenious and picturesque example of camou- 
flage in trench warfare within his observation. 
It was conceived and executed by a Canadian 
trapper, who knew nothing about art, but did 
know the tricks of his own game. He came from 
the wilds of the British Northwest to enlist. 
Being a superb shot, he was granted by the 
British, who recognized his qualifications as a 
sniper, an unusual privilege. Equipped with a 
regular service rifle, he was allowed to bring along 
also his old-fashioned pump-lever repeater, which 
he knew like the palm of his hand. 

*Copyright, Curtis Publishing Company. 
29 



30 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

Now, in the sector where his battalion found 
itself, a tragic and curious thing kept happening. 
An undue number of scouts, sent out exploring 
in No Man's Land, failed to return. In the dark 
— no searchlights out, no flares up — the Canadians 
would hear shots from the German trenches; 
and in the morning the field glass would reveal 
the scouts lying dead, out between the lines. 

The trapper started to puzzle this out. Finally 
he noticed one peculiar thing: Near the body of 
each dead man was a low stake, which might have 
escaped the attention of any eye less subtle, since 
many and various broken, scattered objects lie 
in No Man's Land. That night, carefully swing- 
ing wide of all stakes, he went exploring. He 
found that the stakes, on the German side, were 
touched up with bright phosphorescent paint. 
Scouts in No Man's Land proceed by crawling. 
Whenever a man passed such a stake on the Ger- 
man side his body blotted out the light of the 
phosphorus to a height of perhaps two feet. A 
sniper, his eye and his sights trained exactly on 
that vertical line of light, had only to pull the 
trigger. 



A CANADIAN'S CAMOUFLAGE 31 

Having ascertained and reported this, the trap- 
per, by permission of his commanding officer, 
contrived some man-traps of his own invention. 
At night he carried these contrivances out on 
No Man's Land, and cannily reaching round the 
phosphorous-painted German traps, placed one 
before each post. Then from the top leaf of each 
trap he ran a wire into his own trench. 

His traps now set, he crawled out to a good 
vantage point between the lines, with a signalling 
string attached to his waist. When he was ready 
he jerked out a signal. A comrade in the trench 
pulled the wire attached to the nearest trap. 
The top leaf lifted, blotting out the phosphorescent 
light of the post, giving exactly the effect of a 
man crawling past. The German sniper fired. 
Then, as is the custom with German snipers, he 
fired again to make sure. That second shot 
caused his own death. By the flash of the first 
shot the trapper located him. At the flash of 
the second he fired — and got his man. 

A separate German sniper was assigned to each 
post, it appears. The trapper went down the 
line that night, working the same trick; in every 



32 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

case, his comrades believe, he killed or wounded 
a German sniper. Afterward, he brought back 
his traps, hoping to work the same trick again; 
but the Germans, perceiving that something had 
gone wrong, went out the next night and pulled 
up their stakes. 

This trick of impersonating a man by means 
of a board, Mr. Irwin explained, was simply 
primitive, though ingenious, camouflage. Of 
course the trapper was himself camouflaged, when 
he fired, by some one of a dozen tricks borrowed 
from the Indians or invented since the war began. 
Of these methods it is not well to speak; though 
indeed, the enemy may know all about them. 
Most of them depend on tricks of protective 
coloration — on blending a man with his surround- 
ings, as a leopard blends with the lights and shad- 
ows of jungle foliage. 




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AIRPLANE CAPTURES A TRENCH 

FREE-LANCE attacks by airmen on what- 
ever takes their fancy down below them 
have gradually developed into a useful 
phase of aerial warfare on the western front. 
Captain Alan Bott in "Cavalry of the Clouds" 
has pointed out that the introduction of such 
tactics was not planned beforehand and carried 
out to order. They were the outcome of a new set 
of circumstances and almost unconscious enterprise. 
The proximity of the enemy to machines hover- 
ing over a given area bred in the airmen concerned 
a desire to swoop down and terrify the Boche. 
Movement in a hostile trench was irresistible, 
and many a pilot shut off his engine, glided across 
the lines, and let his observer spray with bullets 
the home of the Hun. 

"The star turn last year (1916)," writes Captain 
Bott, "was performed by a British machine that 
captured a trench. The pilot guided it above the 

33 



34 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

said trench for some hundred yards, while the 
observer emptied drum .after drum of ammunition 
at the crouching Germans. A headlong scramble 
was followed by the appearance of an irregular 
line of white billowings. The enemy were waving 
handkerchiefs and strips of material in token of 
surrender! Whereupon our infantry were sig- 
nalled to take possession — which they did." 



DIGGING TRENCHES UNDER FIRE 

EJTENANT ANTOINE REDIER in " Com- 
rades in Courage" describes most vividly 
the digging of a trench toward the enemy: 

I will tell you about one, a masterpiece, of 
which we were truly proud. I will try to be 
modest but without promising to succeed. 

We were ordered to trace, in front of the trench 
which my section occupied, a gallery one hundred 
and fifty metres in length, extending from our 
line straight toward the Boches. What was it 
for? That was a mystery. Two days later we 
were to learn that it was the route for an attack. 
That evening my mind was obsessed with one 
idea: to advance a trench one hundred and fifty 
metres in a perfectly straight line. The words 
"perfectly straight" amazed me. I ran to the 
telephone: 

"Hello! Commandant, must the line be per- 
fectly straight?" 

as 



2,6 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

"Yes, absolutely. Hurry, for you must finish 
in two night s." 

% We had, at this point, a completed section of 
trench forty metres long leading forward to a 
listening post. After a consultation with my 
officers we decided to utilize this and extend it 
one hundred and ten metres farther. We climbed 
out of the trench and started off toward the 
German line, counting the paces. We experienced 
an emotion different from those we usually feel 
when out on skirmishing or patrol duty. At such 
a time a man is waging war, he can use prudence 
or aggression, can reconnoitre and retreat. This 
night we were going out into the unknown much 
as Christopher Columbus went toward America. 
Only a few days earlier our trenches had been 
pushed forward and we did not as yet have 
definite information as to the distance separating 
us from the enemy. We had the feeling that we 
might, at any moment, run into his barbed-wire 
entanglements. 

As we advanced, I posted my two companions 
at different points to make my return easier, and 
I counted off the last forty paces alone. I had a 



DIGGING TRENCHES UNDER FIRE 37 

curious feeling. There was absolutely no noise, 
and the darkness was so complete that I could 
not even tell where to place my feet. Suppose the 
Germans had heard us and prepared an ambuscade! 
I might run against them or actually tread upon 
their bodies! When at last I had measured what 
seemed to me to be the hundred and ten paces, I 
added two more, either for the sake of my con- 
science or purely in bravado — I do not know which 
— and stuck my cane into the ground. 

From that moment this was conquered ground. 
To win it, it had been necessary to master an 
emotion. All of us would now be able to walk 
along this line without a thought of danger. That 
danger still existed, still was great, but no longer 
would we be conscious of it. 

But how were we to make our line straight? 
You would doubtless say: Stretch a cord and 
follow it. The problem, however, was not so 
simple. Forty metres of our line were already 
traced and dug. If my cord commenced at the 
end of this completed portion I would have two 
straight elements, but they would almost certainly 
be angulated at their junction. You would then 



38 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

perhaps tell me to start my cord near the beginning 
of the completed trench. Wise words, but my 
cord was too short ! I had never studied surveying 
but had often seen the red-and-white stakes used 
in that work. Surveyors place two stakes in the 
desired direction and then project a third one by 
sighting over the two already placed. A long 
line may be made quite as straight in this manner 
as with the best-stretched cord. I had no stakes, 
but I had men who might be substituted for them. 
My eye could not pierce no metres of the inky 
darkness, but I was able to see two paces ahead. 
I therefore posted some men two paces apart 
and in a line which pointed in the right direction. 
By lying down and looking upward, with the sky 
as a background, I could see a part of the line 
which their motionless figures made. When this 
was absolutely straight, two men ran along to the 
right and left of the file and marked the two sides 
of the trench. In this way the line was completed, 
and the work of excavation begun. 

It is in times like these that one gets an insight 
into the characters of the men. For the most 
advanced positions we called for volunteers. 



DIGGING TRENCHES UNDER FIRE 39 

These were the best workers. Farther back one 
found the slackers who were continually resting 
with their arms crossed on the handles of their 
spades. Those who were afraid showed it by 
commencing to dig furiously the moment they 
had reached their assigned position in order to 
make a hole to shelter themselves. Once pro- 
tected, their ardor slackened visibly, for they 
knew that when they had finished their portion 
they would be asked to recommence farther for- 
ward and thus expose their precious skin anew. 
Finally there were the talkative ones whom even 
proximity to the Germans could not repress. It 
is no use trying to stop a man of that type. He 
says something, spits on his hands, says something 
more, and so on. Little by little, while he chatters 
and works, the trench takes shape, deepens, and is 
finished. Let them send up as many illuminat- 
ing rockets as they please, we no longer have to 
bend forward to conceal ourselves and the trick 
is won. 

At 2 a.m. I sent my men off to lie down, but I 
remained, waiting for daybreak. I wished to 
know whether my line was straight. I found one 



4 o SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

of my sergeants had also remained and was busily 
examining the trench. 

"Why did you stay?" I asked him. 

"For no special reason, sir." 

"Did you want to see whether the trench was 
straight?" 

"Perhaps, sir." 

He was a big youth of the tenacious type. 
He had been working on this trench in the same 
way in which he makes aluminium rings from the 
fuse caps of German shells. He works at them 
with all his heart and never lets up until they are 
finished and a credit to him. 

When at last the dawn came I tasted one of 
the purest joys of my life. Each of us, in turn, 
sighted from the entrance of the boyau and found 
that we could see from one extremity to the other 
without moving and that a bullet fired from a 
rifle would go through from end to end. Five 
minutes later I was dreaming like a king upon my 
straw. 



LONE AUSTRALIAN STORMED A TRENCH 

THE bayonet is still the decisive weapon in 
battle. It has been carefully impressed 
on all ranks of the British forces that the 
rifle and bayonet are — and always will be — the 
principal arms of the infantryman, and that 
righting units cannot become too expert in their 
use. 

A certain Australian was granted the Victoria 
Cross not only because he performed a very gallant 
feat but also because the British General Staff 
desired to call attention to the fact that in so 
doing he had made a classic use of his rifle and 
bayonet. The incident has been described by 
Eric Fisher Wood in the Saturday Evening Post, 
and proved to be an amazing exploit. 

A small enemy strong point, which lay in front 
of the trenches occupied by his platoon, had been 
very troublesome. Artillery bombardments and 
other ordinary methods of attack had failed to 

41 



42 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

silence it. When these had proved ineffective 
the Australian suggested that he be allowed to 
attempt a surprise attack single-handed. 

The strong point was held by eight Germans, 
but their exact number was unknown to the 
Australian when he volunteered to attack them. 

Though he belonged to the bombing squad of 
his platoon and was, therefore, a specialist in the 
use of that weapon, he, nevertheless, took with 
him no bombs, but relied solely on his rifle and 
bayonet, which is the correct procedure in offensive 
fighting at close quarters. 

He climbed out of his trench and — aided and 
supported by the snipers, rifle grenadiers, bombers, 
and Lewis guns of his own platoon — was able to 
creep unobserved within fifty or sixty yards of the 
enemy position. He was then so close to his ob- 
jective that his own platoon was forced to cease 
fire for fear he might be hit. 

Left entirely to his own resources he rose to his 
feet and charged toward the enemy, one of whom, 
being no longer kept under cover by the opposing 
fire, looked out toward the British lines to see what 
was going on. The German was startled by the 



STORMED A TRENCH 43 

sight of a single British soldier charging toward 
him and already within fifty yards. In his sur- 
prise he fired a single ineffective shot, which, how- 
ever, served to give the alarm to his comrades 
in the trenches behind him. 

Though the Australian's one desire was to come 
to close quarters as quickly as possible, he, never- 
theless, realized that if he allowed the Germans to 
fire at him without retaliation they would be 
able to aim calmly and would certainly bring him 
down. 

At the instant of the enemy's first shot he, there- 
fore, stopped abruptly; and, before the one 
German in sight could aim again, he made a quick 
snapshot and hit the Boche between the eyes. 

Spattered with his brains, the other Germans, 
who at the sound of his shot had started to join 
him on the parapet, on seeing his fate hesitated 
just long enough to afford the Australian a moment 
in which to resume his rush. Taking full advan- 
tage of this pause he covered half the remaining 
distance before another German ventured to 
raise his head above the parapet. 

The instant this second enemy appeared above 



44 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

the ground the Australian tumbled him over with a 
bullet through the brain, and resumed his headlong 
charge before the remaining Germans could collect 
their wits. He reached their parapet, fired a third 
deadly shot as he leaped into their trench, and 
there killed the five now demoralized survivors 
with the cold steel. 

Again aided by the protecting fire of his platoon, 
which covered his retreat, he returned unhurt to 
his own line. 

The platoon organization, cemented together 
by discipline, gave him the opportunity for vic- 
tory; but the victory itself was achieved by the 
will to use the bayonet. 

The support of his platoon organization had 
enabled him to advance unmolested within fifty 
yards of his objective; but from that moment he 
was thrown on his own resources, and his agility, 
courage, and skill in the use of the rifle and bayonet 
had enabled him to dispatch eight enemies and 
to win the coveted Victoria Cross. 



BABES UNSCATHED AMID GUNFIRE 



rp 



HE great German advance against the 



British and French lines in the spring of 
-■* 1918 furnished many imusual and trying 
experiences for civilians living near the front, but 
none of these was more amazing than that of two 
tiny French children who were finally installed 
in a British military hospital. They were among 
the few unfortunate persons who remained in 
Neuve Eglise when the Germans overran that 
place. The town immediately became a centre 
of fighting and was continually changing hands, 
and German soldiers took these two babies into 
trenches for their protection. 

In a counter-attack the British stormed and 
captured the trench. They found the little ones 
safe and sound and brought them back. The 
children had been living under terrific gunfire, 
and how they escaped death could not be accounted 
for. 

45 



46 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

Another French baby was found by two British 
signalmen at another place. As the child had no 
protection, the soldiers took it with them to their 
billet in a barn. 

That night the signalmen went to sleep with the 
baby between them so that no harm might come 
to it. German airmen bombed the barn and 
both the men were killed. The child escaped 
injury and later was rescued by other soldiers. 



THE MAN BEHIND THE DUDE 

4N ENGAGING character, Septimus D'Arcy, 

ZJk figures in "On the Right of the British 
-*■ -^ Line,"* a vivid account of trench warfare 
at its worst by Captain Gilbert Nobbs. 

D'Arcy passed current as a brainless exquisite. 
But as to his outward seeming Captain Nobbs has 
this to say: 

"We may call men fops, simple vacant fools, 
or what we like; but the war has proved over and 
over again that the man within the man is merely 
disguised by his outward covering. Many a 
Bond Street Algy or ballroom idol has proved 
amidst the terrors of war that the artificial cover- 
ing of a peace-time habit is but skin-deep; and 
the real man is underneath." 

One afternoon Captain Nobbs had gone to his 
dugout for needed rest when he was disturbed 
by a voice outside which sounded familiar: 

"There he was, with his monocle riveted in his 

*Copyright, IQ17, by Chas. Scribner's Sons. 
47 



48 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

right eye, between the frown of his eyebrow and 
the chubby fatness of his cheek, with the bored 
expression of one who saw no reason for the 
necessity of the fatigue which caused the undigni- 
fied beads of perspiration to assemble on an other- 
wise unruffled countenance. A pair of kid gloves, 
buttoned together, was hanging from his Sam 
Browne belt, and four inches of a blue-bordered 
silk handkerchief dangled from his sleeve. As 
he approached he half carried on his arm and 
half dragged along the ground the burden that 
was known as his full marching order. 

"'Hello, Septimus!' I said, as he came along, 
dragging his things behind him. 

"'Ah! Hellow! Well, I'll be demaied! Never 
expected to find you here; awfully glad to meet you 
again.' 

"'What are you doing here?' 

"'I']] be demned if I know! Uninteresting 
spot this — what? ' 

"'Well, what have you come here for?' 

"'Nothing much. I saw a fellow in that big 
dugout in the valley, and he told me to report to 
you. The fact is, you know, you are attached 



THE MAN BEHIND THE DUDE 49 

to me, or I'm attached to you, or something of 
that sort.' . . . 

"'How long have you been in the army, Sep- 
timus? ' 

" Three months. Why?' 

"'Like it?' 

"'Not bad. Saluting seems rather absurd; 
but it seems to please some. I longed to come out; 
thought it would be interesting and all that kind 
of thing. But so far I've had nothing to do but 
get from place to place, carrying a beastly load 
with me.' 

" 'Probably your own fault. I have never seen 
a pack or haversack crammed so full. What have 
you brought with you? ' 

"We emptied his pack and haversack. I have 
never in my life seen such a lot of rubbish in the 
war kit of a soldier. There seemed to be nothing 
there he would really need; but a curious mixture 
of strange articles that would nil a fancy bazaar. 
There were hair brushes with ebony backs and 
silver monograms; silk handkerchiefs with fancy 
borders; a pinky tooth paste oozing out of a 
leaden tube; and, crushed between a comb and 



5 o SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

a pair of silk socks, a large bottle of reddish tooth- 
wash, sufficient to last him three years — and half 
of this tooth wash had leaked through the cork 
to the destruction of about a dozen silk handker- 
chiefs, spotted and bordered in fanciful shades. 
There was a box of cigars; a heavy china pot of 
massage cream; a pot of hair-pomade; a leather 
writing case; a large ivory-backed mirror, which 
had lost its usefulness forever; a bottle of fountain- 
pen ink; two suits of pink pyjamas, one striped 
with pink and the other blue; a huge bath towel; 
a case containing seven razors, one for each day 
of the week; and a sponge as big as his head. 
Poor Septimus! in his simplicity and ignorance, 
for the first time in his life he had packed his own 
kit!" 

Presently Captain Nobbs' company and the 
others moved off to relieve a battalion of a London 
regiment and took over the line of shell holes 
that marked the position opposite Combles and 
Leuze Wood. His company was ordered out into 
No Man's Land and to dig in. There was a 
heavy night bombardment from the German side 
— and a lack of ammunition to meet a pending 



THE MAN BEHIND THE DUDE 51 

attack. At this point Captain Nobbs describes 
how Septimus presented himself again: 

"The bombardment continued, but by and 
by we began to grow accustomed to the din. 
Several casualties occurred; but still the work of 
digging continued. . . . 

"A few minutes later I chanced to notice a 
figure sitting leisurely in a shell hole. 

" 'Why, Septimus, is that you ? ' 

"'I think so; I say, I think so. Unearthly row; 
devilish dangerous place, this — what?' 

" 'But what are you doing here? ' 

"'I was just coming to talk to you about am- 
munition. A shell burst, and my face is simply 
covered with dust. Has the ammunition arrived 
yet?' 

"'No; there's an ammunition dump in the wood 
somewhere. ' 

"'Like me to go and find it?' 

"I looked at him in amazement. It wasn't 
funk, then, that made him seek safety in 
that shell hole. Was it possible that dear old 
Septimus — this bland, indifferent, tubby, blase 
old thing of Bond Street — was anxious to go into 



52 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

that creepy, mysterious wood to look for am- 
munition? 

"'All right; take a corporal and twelve men and 
bring back six boxes. Don't take unnecessary 
risks; we shall need every man to-morrow. ' 

"Septimus sprang out of the shell hole, saluted 
in the most correct manner— something quite 
new for him — and disappeared in the darkness. 

"This was a new side of Septimus's character 
which had not shown itself before. Only the 
stoutest heart would have chosen to wander 
about in that wood at midnight, with enemy pa- 
trols lurking about. Septimus was a man, after all. 

"Five minutes later he passed me, leading 
his men. He gripped my hand as he passed, with 
the remark : ' Well ! Ta-ta, old thing ! ' 

"'Cheer oh!' 

"All of a sudden I was startled by a rattle of 
musketry in the direction of the wood. There 
was silence; then several more shots, followed by 
a rushing, tearing noise, and yells. Almost at 
the same moment the ammunition party emerged 
breathless from the wood. 



THE MAN BEHIND THE DUDE 53 

" I ran forward to where the men were dropping 
the ammunition boxes on the ground and falling 
exhausted. Eor a moment or two they were too 
breathless to speak. I counted the men; there 
were twelve of them, and the six boxes of ammu- 
nition had safely arrived. 

"But where were Septimus and the corporal? 
All was silent in the wood. I turned to the nearest 
man, who was by this time sitting up, holding his 
head in his hands. 

"' Where are Mr. D'Arcy and Corporal Brown?' 
I asked. 

"'God knows, sir. They stayed to cover our 
retirement.' 

"'What happened?' 

"'We found the ammunition dump, sir, and 
were just beginning to move the boxes when we 
heard someone moving. We grabbed our rifles 
and waited. There seemed quite a number 
crawling round us. Mr. D'Arcy ordered us to 
retire at once and get the ammunition away at 
any cost; he said he would stay behind and 
cover our retreat, and Corporal Brown offered 
to stay with him. We hadn't gone far, sir, when 



54 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

they opened fire; bullets hit the trees and whizzed 
over our heads. Then we heard a rush and some 
yells. I distinctly heard something in German 
and Mr. D'Arcy 's voice shout back: "Kamerade 
be damned!" Then there was a scuffle; that's all 
I know.' 

"I ordered a relief party and led the way into 
the wood. There was not a sound to be heard as 
we crept forward on our hands and knees toward 
the spot where the ammunition had been found. 

"What was that? We listened breathlessly, 
and again we heard a low groan almost in our 
midst. There was a shell hole in front and, 
crawling along on all fours, I found Septimus 
D'Arcy wounded and helpless, with his left leg 
almost blown away and bleeding from the head. 

"'What's up, D'Arcy? What has happened?' 
I whispered hoarsely. 

"A faint smile of recognition came over his 
pale face as I supported him in my arms. His 
words came painfully: 

" 'The ammunition — is it — safe? ' 

"'Yes, quite safe. But what happened after 
they left?' 



THE MAN BEHIND THE DUDE 55 

"'I stayed behind — with the corporal — to pro- 
tect their retirement. We opened rapid fire — 
to draw German fire on us. I saw six creeping 
forward. They called on us — to surrender. I 
refused — demn them! They threw bombs — killed 
the corporal — dirty dogs! — smashed my leg — 
nothing much. I picked off three — with my re- 
volver — never used the beastly thing before; 
two bolted — last one jumped at me — with bayonet. 
That's him there — just got him — last cartridge. ' 

"Septimus was lying heavily on my arms. 
Nothing could be done for him; I saw the end was 
at hand. 

"' Good-bye, captain! Knew you'd come. 
Don't know much about soldiering — good sport; 
shan't have to carry that — demned pack again!' 

"A placid smile came over his chubby face as 
he gasped out the last words. His monocle 
was still firmly fixed between his fat cheek and his 
eyebrow. Once more he seemed indifferent to his 
surroundings. 

"In front of him, the silent evidence of his 
plucky stand, were the dead bodies of four 
Germans. By his side lay a revolver. I picked 



56 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

it up and examined the chamber; the last cartridge 
had been fired. 

"The men had gathered round; their caps were 
off. Septimus seemed to be looking smilingly 
into their faces. 

"Septimus was dead! But Septimus was still 
in Bond Street!" 



SIX GERMANS FELL BEFORE THIS 
AMERICAN 

THE manner in which American troops 
acquitted themselves as soon as they 
participated in the fighting on the western 
front became early apparent by the bestowal of 
the French Croix de Guerre on a number of them 
for valor. Among them was Homer Whited, of 
Bessemer, Ala., who received the war cross for 
the part he took in a raid which resulted in the 
capture of Germans by American troops without 
the assistance of any of the other troops. 

" We had got into the front trenches at Ancerville 
on the Lorraine front on February 17th/' he said. 
"On the evening of March 5th the snow fell for some 
time, covering the ground about four inches. 
Therefore, when along about n o'clock at night 
Sergeant Vanner, another Alabaman, asked me 
to accompany him and three other fellows from 
my state who were carrying a message from one 

57 



58 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

sector to another, I did not feel like turning out. 
However, they ' kidded' me until I agreed to go * 
along. The other Alabamans in the party were 
Sergeant West and Corporals E. H. Freeman and 
Amos Tesky. 

"We had to pass through five gates between 
the point from which we started and that for 
which we were headed. As we were let through 
the last of these Sergeant Hall ordered me to get 
a couple of hand grenades. I misunderstood the 
order, and thought he said ' See if there is any one 
between us and the gate.' When I reported and 
he found out the mistake I had made, he insisted 
that I go back and get the grenades anyway. 

" It was a mighty good thing he did, as the result 
showed, although we had not the slightest thought 
of encountering any of the enemy. But at a 
traverse we thought we heard voices, and Hall 
challenged. Receiving no answer, he fired. In 
the flash we saw that a party of Germans six times 
as large as our own was upon us. 

"'Give 'em the grenades, Homer,' yelled Hall. 
I gave them all right, and the next minute two 
big Heinies are beating it for me with their hands 



SIX GERMANS FELL 59 

up yelling l Earner ad.' I shoved them behind me 
as I see five more ceming at us over the lip of 
the trench. I emptied five cartridges into them, 
and they came no farther. At the same instant 
I see one of the prisoners coming for me. He had 
got wise to the fact that my gun was empty. 
There was nothing for it but to give him the butt, 
so he got that till he couldn't yell 'Karnerad 7 
any more. 

"When the little tea party was all over there 
were nine dead Germans, and we were able to go 
back with two prisoners. They told our officers 
of the Forty-second Division that there was a 
party of 180 that would soon raid the American 
trenches. We got ready for them, but they never 
came." 



BLEW UP HIS HYDROPLANE AND HIM- 
SELF 

THERE were two men, the pilot and his 
observer, in one of the latest flying boats 
the British makers have turned out. 

They had got well out to sea when a fog sud- 
denly cut them off from the rest of their com- 
panions. The pilot headed for home, but a few 
seconds later the engine "died" and the pilot 
brought the boat to rest on the waters. He 
climbed up to the engine to see if he could make 
good the defect. A glance showed him that only 
a repair shop and a squad of expert mechanics 
could hope to make the engine run. His face 
was slightly more grave when he climbed down 
to the hull again. 

"Are you going to make the works go around 
again, daddy?" asked the observer. 

"Can't be done, my son," said the pilot. "We 

shall have to wait on someone coming to pick us 

up." 

60 



BLEW UP HIS HYDROPLANE 61 

"I suppose the fog will lift soon and give our 
chaps a sight of us. Wake me up before they 
come," and, snuggling still further down into his 
seat, the observer went to sleep. 

The night drew on. The pilot sat up on the 
deck combing, and listened intently for the slight- 
est sign of approaching rescuers, while behind him 
down in the cockpit slept the boy, dreaming of 
home. 

With the coming of the morning the fog lifted 
and the observer glanced eagerly over the shadowy 
waters. For on the horizon was a little black 
smudge growing steadily in size, and behind it 
another smudge, and another. It was a patrol 
flotilla fast approaching them. 

"It is German, my son," said the pilot. "Is 
your lifebelt on securely?" 

"Yes." 

"Well, get over the side and swim as hard as 
you can." 

"But don't you want me to help " 

"Get over the side," said the pilot curtly, and 
there was that in his voice which made the junior 
man instantly obey. "Good-bye, sonny/' be 



62 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

added, as the observer slipped into the water. 
"It is my privilege, you know." 

About two hundred yards away the observer 
paused and looked back at the disabled plane. 
The pilot was crouched on the top of the wing 
underplane, just above the bomb rack, with a 
heavy spanner in his upraised hand ready to strike 
a blow. A mile away the first German destroyer 
was tearing the sea in twain in nervous haste to 
salve the coveted trophy and get away before the 
appearance of the dreaded British patrols. The 
observer turned 'and swam away from the tragedy 
which he knew was about to happen. 

There came the roar of a mighty explosion. 
He heard the swish of the air blast along the sur- 
face waters and the rush of the approaching wave 
from the sea disturbance. The wave engulfed 
him just as he began to hear the splash and patter 
of the falling debris, and in the blackness of its 
heart his senses swam into unconsciousness. He 
was still sobbing deliriously when the British 
patrol boat picked him up an hour later. 



A ONE-LEGGED HERO OF ITALY 

ENRICO TOTI was a hero of the Roman 
populace. Although deprived of one leg 
by a railroad accident, yet his ardent 
"sporting" spirit and his love of adventure and 
hazard sent him into numberless competitions of 
all sorts, and his physical defect was never allowed 
to stand in his way. Before the war he had 
opened a little business in Rome, where he lived 
in the Trastevere quarter, and manufactured 
toys, little trifles in wood, and so forth, with the 
assistance of three or four workmen. With the 
pension which was his and the gains from his work 
he lived comfortably, and gave away to the poor 
nearly all he earned. He was also of great assis- 
tance to the police in keeping order in the neigh- 
borhood, and he was held in the greatest respect. 
At the outbreak of the war he was one of the most 
enthusiastic supporters of the great cause of pa- 
triotism and right, and one of the most eager of 

63 



64 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

volunteers. He had difficulty for a time in being 
placed as he longed to be, and he finally applied 
to the Duke d' Aosta for his aid. Here is his letter : 

Cervignano. 
To His Royal Highness the Duca d'Aosta: 

On the outbreak of the war against barbarous Austria, 
with my flag flying I took part in the demonstrations at 
Rome . . . and everywhere by my words and acts 
I tried to prove to even the most obstinate the necessity 
for this war. I promised later on to make my banner 
float the first on the hill of redeemed S. Giusto. The papers 
of Rome, Milan, of Genoa and elsewhere spoke of this in 
words full of fire and patriotism: I was accompanied to 
the station and flowers and sweets were offered to me. 
Since that day I have been in the war zone, constantly 
exposed to danger without as yet having taken part in 
active service, though recognized by many officers as being 
fit to carry out any daring and difficult undertaking and 
to offer to the Patria my best contribution. I am familiar 
with danger to such a point that no obstacle would be 
great enough to deter me from an enterprise begun. I 
am a fervent citizen of Italy, and even if I must shed my 
last drop of blood I shall never go back. I beg to explain 
my capabilities, and since with one leg only I have merited 
so much esteem on the field of bravery, I hope to prove 
my title to aspire to the honor which I ask. 

For eight years I served the State, in the Royal Navy 
I took part in the campaign in Africa, and I earned the 
right to wear a medal. In the contests held at Spezia in 
1903 I was the champion military bicyclist of the naval 



A ONE-LEGGED HERO 65 

squadron. After I had finished my military service I 
passed examinations to get into the service of the railroads 
and I was the first in knowledge and practical work, and 
some of my mechanical devices were preserved in the 
offices of the General Direction by the head engineer of the 
service. After three years of this work I was the victim 
of a railway accident and my left leg had to be amputated. 
On the restoration of my health, I took up my career of 
sport again and, though with only one leg, gained a medal 
in an international swimming contest on the Tiber in 
Rome. . . . After that I dedicated myself to the 
perfecting of a certain invention and was awarded various 
premiums and medals in different exhibitions where my 
work was shown. 

Then I travelled all over Europe on my bicycle studying 
the different peoples, and my dream has ever been to see 
Italy great and prosperous. I have been all over France, 
Belgium, Holland, Germany, Russia, and so on, and even 
to the Arctic Polar Circle where, on account of the ice, 
I was obliged to remain some time with the Esquimaux of 
Lapland. I crossed Austria and Poland and finally came 
back to Rome and to my family. After some months of 
rest I went to Alexandria and travelled all along the course 
of the Nile and through Egypt and Nubia. In all my 
journey of exploration I travelled about twenty thousand 
kilometres, and I had to encounter tempests of snow, and 
ice, wolves, hyenas, and to suffer every kind of privation, 
and I never yet had to complain. I was proud of my en- 
durance and of my courage, and I was happy to be a 
worthy son of Italy, and in Denmark I had the high honor 
of seeing my photograph by the side of those of their 
Majesties the Sovereigns of Italy. 



66 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

I swear that I have the heart for any undertaking what- 
ever, even the most difficult, and whatever I should be 
ordered to do I would execute without delay. I came into 
the war zone with everything necessary, hoping to join 
the Alpini, but I could not reach them and under the heavy 
fire of the enemy I came down again and wandered from 
trench to trench in the hope of being taken into some corps 
and of giving my services. I captured Austrian guns, 
cartridge belts, and so forth, all of which things I brought 
to headquarters at Cervignano; I have been to Sagrado 
in the neighborhood of Gorizia, on the hills of Castel- 
nuovo, and in my going about I have always observed 
whether the telephone lines had been disturbed, and I 
searched the fields in the hope of seizing some perfidious 
spy. I am now well known to almost all the officers and 
soldiers; one day at Cervignano I was even embraced 
and kissed. I am certain that I could penetrate into the 
enemy's camp and study their positions and discover their 
batteries without being seen by them. The road which 
leads from Cervignano to Monfalcone is most closely 
watched, but by my cunning and the experience which 
I have gained in passing over various countries, I took 
out-of-the-way paths and passed through fields of maize, 
now stooping down and now hiding myself when I saw 
patrols, and I presented myself to the General of the Bri- 
gade at Monfalcone and asked to be taken into the Grena- 
diers, who are fighting heroically for the greatness of 
Italy. He admired my courage, but he was perfectly 
right in saying that he could not assume the responsibility 
without having higher orders. The commander of the 
Royal Carabinieri telegraphed to Rome for information 
regarding me. This was of the best, and so I was 



A ONE-LEGGED HERO 67 

again sent to Cervignano to await some superior 
decision. 

Now I turn to Your Royal Highness, and, knowing that 
the House of Savoy has always been magnanimous and 
generous, I implore you to put me into seme company 
and so to let me have the hope of either dying for the 
( Patria or of entering among the first into Trieste. 

With the expression of my eternal gratitude, 

I am, 

Your Royal Highness's most devoted 

Enrico Toti. 



The Duca d'Aosta, the commander of the Third 
Army, realized his bravery and ability and 
he was allowed to be enrolled in the Bersaglieri, 
in which corps he had served when a young man 
of twenty years of age. For many months he was 
employed in the war zone as a letter carrier and 
messenger. 

Finally, in January, 1916, Major Razzini, com- 
mander of the 3d regiment of Bersaglieri bicyc- 
lists, permitted him to go into the trenches. He 
was an incomparable sentry; he worked as a digger 
of mines or in clearing the ground; he carried 
what loads he could; he was perfectly happy. 
He would tell his companions the story of his 



68 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

adventurous life, stirring up the careless, and — 
although himself crippled — he encouraged the 
weak. 

But when on the 6th of August his battalion 
was ordered to attack the peak of Quota 85 (near 
Monfalcone), he insisted on accompanying his 
companions, and, to repeat the words of his 
colonel: "He was one of the first to reach the 
enemy's trench, throwing bombs and fighting as 
he could with his gun." (He had learned how to 
aim and to fire by holding the barrel of his gun 
under his right arm-pit and sustaining himself on 
his crutch with his left.) " He was wounded three 
times. Dripping blood, he fired and shouted to 
his companions : ' Viva P Italia ! Viva Trieste I 
Viva i Bersaglieri ! ' At his third wound he fell 
to the earth, got up, took two or three steps. 
Then, leaning on his gun, he grasped his crutch — 
the poor symbol of the weakness which for the love 
of his country he had known how to transform 
into strength and heroism — and hurled it in de- 
fiance at the fleeing enemy. Then, falling back, 
he died." 

He was awarded the highest of all honors, the 



A ONE-LEGGED HERO 69 

gold medal, which was consigned to his father 
in Rome in the following September. And here 
are a few extracts from the letter which his colonel 
wrote about him to that same proud father: 

Respected Signor Toti: 

Your son was of a pure heroic spirit, and he was loved 
by us all like a dear brother. 

He presented himself to me in January and was made 
one of our battalion. He took part during the days in 
the trenches in the most difficult and dangerous under- 
takings. In the days of fighting he rendered the most 
precious services to the combatants; but particularly was 
helpful in his indefatigable endeavors in preaching the 
love of country to his fellow Bersaglieri. Not being always 
able to take active part in the battle, to him was often 
confided the reading or commenting on an article adapted 
to be read to our simple and brave soldiers. . . . 

Enrico Toti, the valorous son of Italy, deserved to be 
honored by her patriots, for a nobler and more worthy 
heart and soul never existed in the history of a people. 

His heroism obscures the fame of many an heroic figure, 
and his example should serve to arouse from a cowardly 
lethargy all those who, in order to keep away from danger 
and conflict, take advantage of physical imperfections. 

The soul of Enrico Toti will ever live in us as an emblem 
of duty and of sacrifice. 

Not only you, but Rome and all Italy, should be proud 
of such heroism. 



THREE DAYS IN A SHELL HOLE 

SCOUTING behind the enemy lines in that 
grim terrain — No Man's Land — was the 
principal task of Captain David Fallon, 
late of the Oxford and Bucks Light Infantry, 
before an adventure placed him hots de combat 
near Bapaume on the Somme. 

"It was my duty," wrote the captain, describing 
this adventure, "usually with a small patrol of 
men at my command, to cross the dreaded No 
Man's Land and obtain information in regard to 
the strength of the first line of our foe and the 
disposition of his forces, the trench mortars and 
machine guns. The worst obstacles in this 
scouting are the wire entanglements, meshed so 
carefully and cleverly between the trenches. 
Armed with bombs, a well-tried revolver and a 
special pair of wire clippers I would crawl stealthi- 
ly between the barbed wire and spot the sentries, 
who usually worked in pairs. I would then make 

a detour and try to pass between them." 

70 



THREE DAYS IN A SHELL HOLE 71 

In November, 1916, the British had captured 
Butte de Wallincourt, a strongly fortified place, 
which at one time had been a quarry. They 
captured and lost it the same day, for at this 
engagement the enemy counter-attack was too 
strong for the British and they had to fall back 
into their old front line. 

In consequence of this situation .Captain Fallon 
was detailed on the night of November 15th to 
make a personal reconnaissance of the quarry 
and report the disposition of the trench mortars, 
machine guns, etc. This hazardous venture, as 
told in his own words, provides a lurid glimpse 
of life as lived in No Man's Land: 

"I crawled into the enemy territory and, after 
travelling through three lines of trenches and 
getting the desired positions, I moved toward 
the exit of the trenches and encountered a couple 
of sentries. They threw two bombs at me. I 
threw mine. One of theirs went over my head, 
the other fell at my feet. I picked it up and threw 
it back, and the Boches caught the full blast of 
their own bomb as well as mine. My right hand, 
being in a forward throw position, however, 



72 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

got part of the discharge. The force of the 
explosion blew off my thumb and smashed the 
rest of my hand. My chin bone was injured, 
some of my teeth were dislodged, and the left side 
of my face and my left arm were scorched. But 
I was fortunate enough to retain consciousness. 

"The men in the dugout over which the sentries 
were posted came out and ran after me. But I 
was determined that I should never be taken a 
prisoner. I resisted as well as I could, and when 
I had fired all the shots in my revolver I fled and 
found cover in a mud-filled shell hole. They had 
lost sight of me, but were still searching for me 
and coming in my direction. I filled my lungs 
like a swimmer and submerged in the thick water 
until they had passed. It was necessary to do 
this three times, for they still stayed about me. 

"When they returned to their trenches a heavy 
machine-gun fire was opened, sweeping the 
whole of No Man's Land — ' typewriting ' we 
term it. This continued at least half an hour. 
Though shells fell around me, none of them 
reached me in my hiding place. 

"Well down in the hole, I opened my field dress- 



THREE DAYS' IN A SHELL HOLE 73 

ing packet and poured iodine over my right hand, 
where was my most dangerous wound. Then 
bandaging it I made a tourniquet of my handker- 
chief. With my knife I tapped the arteries feed- 
ing my lower arm. 

"I could not move from this position, as 
I was only about twenty yards from the Boche 
lines and under observation all the time of sentry 
groups posted near. Thinking that I might have 
to stay for a few days, I counted my stock of 
provisions and found I had but four biscuits, 
seven small pieces of chocolate, a couple of cigars, 
and a package of cigarettes. I then rationed my- 
self and made two meals from one biscuit and 
two pieces of chocolate and a little water. I 
dared not smoke, for the smoke would have given 
away my position. 

"The whole night was illuminated with bursting 
shells and the flames of the rockets, which were 
continually flying skyward. The shells from our 
lines were bursting all around me. It was as if the 
lid of hell had been blown away and the fires were 
scorching me. 

"All through the night and the next day the 



74 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

machine guns kept up their hymn of hate, and I 
was often hit with pieces of mud and stone that 
were sent flying by the explosion of shells. My 
wounds were paining frightfully. It seemed as 
if I were clinging to a live electric wire. I was 
hot and cold at the same time. But through it all 
I was confident that I should pull through some 
way or other. I felt, having dodged death so 
many times, that I wasn't born to die in this mud- 
filled hole. 

"I tried to get out the following night, for the 
pains were becoming excruciating. It seemed as 
if I could no longer endure my cramped quar- 
ters. My body filled most of the hole and the 
only movement I had was up and down, and the 
water was uncomfortably high. But the Boches 
gave me no chance to escape. And on the second 
and third days I sought opportunities, but in vain. 

"On the third day I had two biscuits left and 
I thought that if I ate one I should have one left 
for the next day and if I were still there I should 
have to cut that in halves to provide for another 
day. But that evening during the hymn of hate 
I made up my mind that it must be: do or die. 



THREE DAYS IN A SHELL HOLE 75 

I was weak from the loss of blood; my teeth, which 
were broken, were chattering, and I was shaking 
all over as if I had ague. 

"I crawled out and made a dart to the lines 
of the Scotch Canadians who were nearest me. 
As I ran I stumbled in shell holes, tripped over 
dead men, and fell into barbed wire, tearing strips 
of flesh from my body. The shells were dropping 
all around me, throwing clouds of soft earth 
into my face. But I was determined to reach 
my friends. 

"I took all precautions to guard against the 
snipers, both Prussian and Canadian, for at night 
neither friend nor foe is recognizable in No Man's 
Land. Many a man has fallen a victim to his own 
army's shot and shell. 

"I made a detour and got around the Canadian 
lines and shouted: 'Oh, Canadians!' 

"After a few feeble shouts, for I was utterly 
exhausted, I heard the reply: 'Who is there?' 

"'A British officer — wounded!' I cried. 

"The Canadian that came out to assist me into 
the trench was wounded in his left arm by a 
sniper's bullet. When I expressed my concern, 



76 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

having been the cause of his mishap, he merely 
replied: 'Never mind, sir; it is all in the game.' 

"It is a tremendous game — the only game of 
to-day. But my part is played. After nine 
months in hospital I was declared unfit for further 



service." 



PICKS, SHOVELS, AND CLASP KNIVES 

4N OUTSTANDING feature of the German 

/% counter-attack at Cambrai — after the 
**- *■ British commander, General Byng, had 
made his great advance toward the close of 191 7 — 
was the part that the American engineers played 
when the Germans streamed behind the lines. 
The engineers had been with the British forces 
for six months and had helped to put the railroads 
in shape and construct machine-gun emplace- 
ments. 

The Germans finally succeeded in breaking 
through the British lines on the flank at Gouzeau- 
court, where the American engineers were at work. 

"The next morning when we started work," 
wrote one participant in the fight, "German shells 
were breaking about 500 yards from the railroad. 
While we did not anticipate being engulfed in an 
attack, still there was a strong feeling that some- 
thing was about to crack. Being unarmed, we 

77 



78 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

cast many anxious glances at the steadily nearing 
curtain of fire. 

"And the nearer it came the less we worked. 
One of the men, who had changed his heavy English 
field shoes for a pair of fight tan dress shoes that 
morning, remarked to the Captain: 'You can let 
'em come, Cap; I'm in light running order.' 

"And they did come, hordes of them. First 
they raised the range of their artillery and soon 
shells were bursting all around us. The barrage 
passed over us like a hailstorm. Turning around 
we saw what seemed to us like myriads of gray- 
clad Huns. Orders placing us 'on our own' were 
given and every man had to choose his own way 
of getting out of the path of that storm of lead 
and shrapnel. Most of us stayed in the open, 
trusting to Providence and our heels to carry us 
safely over the hills. Others took advantage of shell 
craters or anything that would afford shelter from 
rifle fire. Some hid in dugouts and didn't make 
their appearance until the Huns were driven back." 

But some held their ground. A number of 
them determined to stay in a certain dugout. 
What took place there when the Germans came 



SHOVELS AND CLASP KNIVES 79 

was vividly related by a sergeant to Patrick 
McGill: 

"We were working three miles to rear of the 
front line when Heiney opened his barrage. That 
was at 7 : 1 5 in the morning of November 30th. We 
got orders to hike back, for there was not much 
good in staying there, as we were not armed, 
though we'd willingly have backed our fists against 
the German bayonets. 

" Some of us had to stay behind, so we got into 
a dugout and waited to see what was going to take 
place. We took an oath that the Germans, if 
they came along, wouldn't get by where we were 
unless they went over our dead bodies. Some 
of the guys had shovels; others, spades; and a few, 
picks. 

There was one fellow who had been taken pris- 
oner by the Germans at the beginning of the war 
when he was serving in the French army. He 
escaped and came across to America, his native 
country. This soldier had no weapon but a clasp 
knife, but he swore he would cut his own throat 
before he would allow himself to be taken prisoner 
again. 



80 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

" Well, the hell-fire barrage had hardly stopped 
before the Germans were at our dugout door. 
They came along damned quick. One guy in a 
gray uniform stuck his head through the door 
and the next minute the man with the clasp knife 
was at his throat. It was a quick despatch for 
that Heiney, for the steel got him in the breast 
and he went down almost without a word. 

"Then we got into action with spades and shovels 
and picks. There was one feller went for the 
Germans like a bull, swinging his spade over his 
shoulder and crashing them down. He got half 
a dozen of them down before he went to the ground 
himself with five bayonet wounds in his side. 

"Well, what with our picks and shovels and 
clasp knives it was more than those Germans 
could do to get past us. You could hear nothing 
while the fight was on but groans and red language 
and the hough of spades crashing through the 
men in field gray. And in the end they turned 
and ran away, all that was left alive. Then we 
got our wounded in tow and carried them back 
as well as we were able." 




by Underwood IS Underwood 

MODERN GRENADIERS 

These heroes of trench warfare may be blown up by their own treacher- 
ous weapons or by the grenades of the enemy. They await the attacks 
with confidence 



REJECTED AS A PRISONER OF WAR 

GERMAN U-boats want no wounded pris- 
oners, lest they succumb to their injuries. 
The commanders must deliver live cap- 
tives at their base in order to receive a bonus. 

On account of wounds received by being blown 
from the bridge into the hold and swimming 
through the hole made in his ship's side by a sub- 
marine's torpedo, Captain Walter K. Miller, of 
Brooklyn, of the American steamship Atlantic 
Sun, underwent the curious experience of being 
rejected as a prisoner of war when his vessel was 
sunk off the Irish coast in March, 191 8. 

"I had just left the bridge," ran his narrative, 
"and was eating my dinner when the alarm was 
given. I started up the short flight of stairs to 
the chart room and had made about half the dis- 
tance when the torpedo hit us. 

"There was a terrific roar and a shock which 

seemed to shake the ship to pieces. I was 

81 



82 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

stunned and the next thing I knew I was flounder- 
ing under the water, surrounded by wreckage. 
It instantly dawned upon me that I had been 
blown forward over the bridge down into the hold 
through the deck ripped open by the explosion and 
that I was being carried down with my ship. 

" I opened my eyes, however, and looked around, 
and to my right I saw a small patch of green water, 
not much bigger than a window, toward which I 
swam, and I succeeded in wriggling my way 
through the jagged hole made by the torpedo in 
the ship's side. Clear of the ship, my real fight 
commenced — that of overcoming the suction and 
getting to the surface, where I found and grabbed 
hold of a floating barrel, to which I clung while 
getting my breath. 

"The barrel, however, was being drawn into 
the vortex and I let loose, swimming away toward 
a capsized boat, which held me safe until the dan- 
ger of being drawn down was over. Shortly 
after I was discovered and picked up by the men 
in one of our boats which had been launched. 

"The submarine which sank us was but a 
short distance away and we were ordered by a 



REJECTED AS A PRISONER S3 

German officer to come alongside and surrender 
one of the ship's officers. 

"My men tried to shield me by removing my 
coat, but somehow I must have been recognized 
and I was told to get into the U-boat. I was weak 
from my struggle and covered with blood from 
several bad wounds on my shoulders and arms — 
and the German officer refused to take me, saying: 

" 'We have no use for a dead man — or one who 
is going to die — I have to take back with me an 
officer who will be alive when I reach our base. 
If I do we get a bonus.' 

"He then asked for one of the mates and was 
told they had all gone down. The German com- 
mander, however, would not take our word for it 
and searched the boats until in some manner he 
recognized the first officer and he took him pris- 



oner.' ' 



Some hours after the torpedoing Captain Miller 
and his men were picked up by trawlers and landed 
at a British port 



WITH ONE GUN SILENCED A GERMAN 
BATTERY 

THERE was a famous fight undertaken Dy 
L Battery of the Royal Horse Artillery 
at Nery, hard by Compiegne, on Septem- 
ber i, 1914. Describing it in his "Retreat from 
Mons," (Cassell & Co.), Major A. Corbett-Smith 
called the episode one of the most wonderful 
incidents of the war. 

"L Battery," runs his narrative, "was working 
with the First Cavalry Brigade, which was made 
up of the 2d Dragoons (Queen's Bays), the nth 
Hussars, and the 5th Dragoons. For the benefit 
of the uninitiated, it may be explained that 
a horse artillery battery of six guns forms an 
integral part of a cavalry brigade; wherever the 
cavalry go, there go the ' Horse Gunners,' for 
the gun is of lighter calibre than that of the field 
batteries. 

"About two o'clock in the morning word reached 
84 



SILENCED A GERMAN BATTERY 85 

Second Corps H. Q. that a strong force of 
Germans — ninety guns and cavalry — was moving 
toward the First Cavalry Brigade in bivouac 
at Nery. The Third Army Corps, which was 
still included in General Smith-Dorrien's com- 
mand, was also not far away. Our cavalry 
were actually bivouacked within about 600 yards 
of the Germans, and I believe that our outposts 
were, for some reason or other, not sufficiently 
advanced. . . . 

"Half -past four in the morning, and the mists 
have scarcely begun to rise above the beech trees. 
You picture the guns of L Battery parked in line 
just on the downward slope of a slight hill and in a 
little clearing of the woods. The horses of the 
gun teams are tethered to the gun and limber- 
wheels; others are down at a little stream hard by, 
where some of the men are washing and scrubbing 
out their shirts. The Queen's Boys are in bivouac 
in a neighboring field, 

"'Some of our scouts out there, aren't there?' 
remarked a shoeing-smith, pointing to some rising 
ground about 500 yards to the north, 'or is it 
some French cursers (cuirassiers)?' 



86 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

" 'Looks more like Germans to me/ said one of 
the gunners. 'Let's have a squint through the 
telescope.' 

"'What's up?' said the sergeant-major, passing 
at the moment. 

"'Half a mo!' mumbled the gunner, eye glued 
to the battery telescope. 'Yes, it is — Germans — 
I can see the spiky helmets.' 

"'Rot!' returned the sergeant-major. 'Can't 
be!' 

"'Anyway, I'm off to report to the captain.' 
returned the gunner. [The captain was Captain 
E. K. Bradbury, to whose bravery Major Corbett- 
Smith paid a tribute.] 

"Bradbury was talking to the horses by one 
of the guns when a breathless gunner of the battery 
staff appeared with the telescope. 

"'Beg pardon, sir, but there are ' 

"Crash! A percussion shell burst clean in the 
middle of the battery, followed the next instant 
by a couple more and in the few moments' breath- 
less pause it was realized that practically every 
horse and every driver was either killed outright or 
wounded. 



SILENCED A GERMAN BATTERY 87 

"'Action rear!' yelled Bradbury, who found 
himself in command. 

"Their leader's voice above the unholy din 
pulled them together, and the gun detachments, 
such as were left, leapt to the trails to get the 
limbers clear. But no more than three guns 
could they get into action. 

"Now a tornado of shell and machine-gun 
bullets from close range burst over and through 
the devoted remnant — Bradbury, three subalterns 
(GifTard, Campbell, and Mundy), the sergeant- 
major, a sergeant, a couple of gunners, and a 
driver. And in action against them were ten 
German field guns, and two machine guns enfilad- 
ing from the wood. 

" Of their three guns, they had to abandon two. 

" 'All hands no. 2 gun ! ' called Bradbury, who, 
with the sergeant, had already opened fire. 

"The others rushed the few yards to Bradbury's 
gun, but even in that short space Giffard was hit 
five times. Bradbury acted as No. 1 (layer), 
the sergeant as No. 2, while Mundy acted as 
observing officer. One of the gunners and the 
driver carried across all the ammunition by hand, 



88 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

through the hail of lead, from the firing battery 
wagons. 

"The range was, say, 600 yards, but in such a 
nerve-racking storm it was difficult for the little 
detachment to work clearly with no one to 
observe the burst of the shells. There was only 
a little chance, but Mundy took it, and stepped 
calmly out from the shelter of the gun-shield to 
observe. 

"Then No. 2 gun began its work in earnest. 

"'Five more minutes left,' said Mundy ■, 'add 
twenty-five.' 

"Crack went the report. 'One out! T said 
Mundy. 

"'Ten minutes more right; drop twenty-five/ 

"Crack again! 'Short,' murmured Mundy; 
then, 'add twenty-five.' 

'"Two out!' he counted. 

"When three German guns had been counted 
out, Bradbury called over his shoulder to the 
sergeant-major: 

'"Take my place; I'll load for a bit.' 

" He had barely changed places when a bursting 
shell carried away a leg at the thigh. Yet, by 



SILENCED A GERMAN BATTERY 89 

some superhuman will-power, he stuck to his post 
and went on loading. 

"Now Mundy was mortally wounded. Then 
Campbell fell. But still the gun was served, 
laid, and fired. As surely were the German guns 
being counted out, one by one. 

"Then there burst through. another shell. The 
gallant Bradbury received his death-wound, and 
his other leg was carried away. The rest of the 
detachment were all wounded. Still that tiny 
remnant stuck to it through the storm. 

"Now only are left the sergeant-major, Sergeant 
Nelson, the gunner, and the driver. Still they 
work. Still they watch one enemy gun after 
another ceasing to fire, until all are counted out — 
all but one. 

" The ammunition is finished. Nothing left now 
but to crawl back out of that hell. I Battery 
coming up? Well, they can finish it. Lend us 
some ' wheelers' to get our guns back. 

" So were the six guns of L Battery brought out 
of action. Torn and battered, but safe. Glorious 
relics of perhaps the most wonderful action a 
battery of the Regiment has ever fought — and won. 



9 o SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

"I Battery opened on the massed columns of 
the German cavalry now appearing, and rent 
mighty lanes through their ranks, turned and 
scattered them. The Queen's Boys, who had 
been working as infantry — for their horses stam- 
peded when the firing began — collected up, and, 
with I Battery and the Lincolns, went over the 
hill after the retiring enemy. 

"There they found the German battery, out of 
action and abandoned." 



BOTH FOES IN A FIERY EMBRACE 

LIEUTENANT FLOCK and Sergeant 
Rodde were flying above Mulhausen on 
-*' March 18, 1916, in a slow-going observing 
machine, when suddenly out of a floating cloud 
above them darted a German Fokker which had 
been concealed from their view within the cloud. 
They turned and dived for safety, but the swifter 
fighting machine had them at its mercy. The 
German outmanoeuvred them on every turn, and, 
despite all their artifices, the Hun kept safely 
outside their zone of fire. 

A running fight of many minutes ensued, and 
as the French lines drew closer the French airmen 
were beginning to hope for a safe escape from the 
unequal combat, when suddenly their antagonist 
darted beneath them and, coming upright on his 
tail, poured a stream of lead into them from below. 
Their fuel tank was punctured, and immediately 
their airplane was ablaze. 

91 



92 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

Without an instant's hesitation, Flock lowered 
his elevators and his blazing machine nosed down. 
Before the exulting Boche could recover his control 
the French biplane crashed into him, and the two 
machines, crushed into one blazing funeral pyre, 
sped swiftly downward into the woods of Alsace. 



A THREE-MINUTE TRENCH RAID 

BRIGADIER-GENERAL H. PAGE 
CROFT, writing — in his "Twenty- two 
Months Under Fire" (John Murray, 
London) — of the vicissitudes of an infantry brigade 
of which he was in command relates the following 
incident: 

"About this time I organized a raid for June 
2d (1916), which was duly carried out by the 
Durham Light Infantry. I favored a small raid, 
and twenty-five picked officers and men were 
told off for the work. Twice during the day the 
group of artillery covering us gave an intense 
bombardment, while our mortars cut a gap in 
the wire, and the idea was for the infantry to 
leave our trenches while our field artillery was 
actually firing on the enemy trench and while 
our mortars were firing over the heads of the 
infantry. 

"When I state that the trenches at the point 
93 



94 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

selected were just under seventy yards apart, 
it will be realized that we had some confidence 
in our artillery. 

"Punctually to the moment, as our artillery 
commenced one minute's intense bombardment, 
the raiders left our trench and were crossing our 
wire whilst our shells were bursting on the German 
trench. Precisely at the minute's conclusion, the 
guns on the objective ceased, and those to either 
flank continued. Our raiders entered the German 
trench without casualty and separated according 
to plan. Breathless moments these for the raiding 
party. The officer leading them ran straight into 
two Huns and shot them both; they continued 
along the pitch-dark trench when they came to 
a gap. The second officer, turning down there, 
suddenly sees a German; he snaps at him with an 
automatic pistol which misfires, the German fires 
his rifle and misses at two yards and charges with 
his bayonet; again the automatic pistol fails to 
fire, when, by the greatest luck, the first officer, 
hearing the noise, rushes up, and there, in the 
narrow gap, shoots the German dead over the 
shoulder of his friend. 



THREE-MINUTE TRENCH RAID 95 

"A Durham in the main trench is now engaged 
in a life-and-death bayonet fight with a huge 
German. The officer dares not fire his revolver, 
because parry and thrust, advance and retreat 
go on between these two, and to shoot might be 
fatal to the wrong man; but the Durham lad was 
no chicken, and after as pretty a bout as could 
be desired, he killed his man. 

"Meanwhile a sergeant, leading the party which 
turns right, bayonets three Germans in quick 
succession, and the bombing party is at work.' 
Five great dugouts, lit by electricity, and teeming 
with Germans, are duly bombed, and death i§ 
dealt with a free hand. 

" I had given implicit orders that I must have a 
live German for identification purposes, and a 
small Durham was accordingly marching off with 
a huge Hun when suddenly, in the pitch dark, 
the German realizes he is near the entrance to a 
dugout which was unknown to our man, so he 
hurls himself down the dugout entrance, lugging 
the escort with him. Just as the Durham is disap- 
pearing down the hole, one of his comrades arrives 
on the scene, and, by slinging his bayonet down 



9 6 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

the hole, kills the big man just in time. And so 
perishes my live Hun. 

"Now the whistle blows and the raiders retire 
through the gap in the wire — which had been cut 
by a special party detailed; a rocket goes up, and 
guns, mortars, and grenades all pour in their fire 
to cover the retirement of the raiders, while Lewis 
and machine guns rake the enemy trench right and 
left. Behold! The whole of the raiders are safe 
back, and one may be excused a sigh of relief. 

"In this raid, where fighting in the trench is 
carried on hand to hand, the Durhams slew, with 
bayonet and bullet, twelve Germans; and at the 
lowest estimate, killed twelve Germans in each 
of the five dugouts bombed or, seventy-two 
Germans killed. 

" Our total casualties were : two men very slightly 
wounded by the back-splash of their own bombs. 

" The whole operation had taken three minutes 
— a fairly intense three minutes this, and fine 
work — but we knew that we owed much to the 
perfect shooting of the guns and mortars, for a 
single error of a few yards by a gun would have 
spoilt the whole show. 



BALKED THE ENEMY AT THEIR 
FUNERAL PYRE 

ON SEPTEMBER 10, 191 5, a French recon- 
naissance biplane, piloted by Lieutenant 
Le Gall and occupied by Captain Sollier 
as observer, was circling disdainfully over the 
German guns at a low elevation and plainly within 
the sight of the admiring poilus from their trenches. 
Captain Sollier was correcting his map of the 
enemy's position and was jotting down in his note- 
book frequent items of interest as the enemy 
strongholds were revealed to his survey. 

Le Gall, the pilot, amused himself with watching 
the futile bursts of anti-aircraft shells as they 
dotted the air behind him. Far overhead sat a 
trio of scouting machines guarding them from 
attack by enemy airmen. 

Suddenly a German shell burst directly beneath 
them. The explosion hurled the biplane violently 
upward. The machine turned upside down, and 

97 



o8 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

as the two comrades looked at each other they 
saw a burst of flame gush from the ruptured fuel 
tank behind them. 

The wind was blowing toward the French 
lines. As the airplane dropped, swooping this 
way and that, the hot flames alternately licked 
their faces, paused there for an instant, then swept 
away from them with the breeze, only to return 
to their torture with the following swoop. Their 
clothing was ablaze, and a landing-place was still 
hundreds of feet distant. They could not hope 
to reach it. The blazing machine must crash 
inside the German lines; the shock of landing 
might extinguish the flames, and in this case their 
papers would be left unconsumed in the hands of 
the enemy. 

Captain Sollier, who sat nearest the blaze, 
reached forward and handed his pilot some of his 
maps and his note-book. Both began rapidly 
tearing the papers into tiny squares. No matter 
whether the fire consumed them or not, no infor- 
mation should be saved for the enemy! 

The breeze carried the fluttering fragments 
across the trenches into the French lines, and as 



BALKED THE ENEMY 99 

the white-faced poilus saw them falling they un- 
covered their heads and bowed low in their rever- 
ence for this last act of devotion to their beloved 
France. 



A CHARLIE CHAPLIN GAIT AND A TOP 
HAT CARRIED THE TRENCH 

PRIVATE BALL needs introducing. He 
was a clown of the trenches, a humorist 
of humorists as Thomas Atkins — who is 
no bad judge — understood the breed, and the 
comic spirit in him finally earned him "a bit of 
ribbon," that is, a decoration for valor. 

He belonged to A Company of the Royal 
Huntingdonshire Regiment. One day his com- 
pany had fallen in along the cobbled street of a 
gray-walled French village, "standing easy," 
until the voice of the sergeant-major came: 
"Company, 'shun!" The company responded, 
whereupon the sergeant-major discovered that 
one of them was missing. It was Private Ball. 

Presently a little man appeared with an ex- 
ceedingly small head, which was hatless. His 
tardiness, he explained, was due to a missing hat, 
and he could find no other to fit him on account 



A CHARLIE CHAPLIN GAIT . 101 

of his diminutive head. He was ordered to obtain 
any hat he could find and return to join his platoon. 

The company remained at attention, stiff and 
solemn as gate posts, each man with the regulation 
wooden look. Then their faces suddenly collapsed 
and a roar of laughter broke from their ranks. 
Even the stern sergeant-major pretended to blow 
his nose and Captain Merrington was troubled 
with a fly in his throat. Bearing down on the 
company, rifle at the slope, came Private Ball, 
wearing a dingy top hat, and with a look of "un- 
impeachable righteousness on his india-rubber 
countenance," as the late Lieut. H. Featherston 
Clark, who told the story in [ the T lanchester 
Guardian, described his physiognomy. His cap- 
tain had bidden him choose any hat, and his impish 
humor had determined the selection. 

Private Ball's top hat featured another and less 
diverting scene a few weeks later, when his com- 
pany and many others were going "over the top" 
to storm a very strong piece of the German line. 
Lieutenant Clark wrote: 

"Captain Merrington was taking a final look 
through a periscope at the frontage his company 



102 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

was about to assault. He looked cheerful enough 
— he always looked cheerful on these occasions — 
but his thoughts were grave. The bit of line his 
company had to attack was extremely strong and 
lay between the horns of two small salients in the 
enemy line. Therefore the space that A Company 
would have to cross would be swept by flanking 
machine-gun fire from both sides. 

"The captain had chosen Private Ball to be his 
'observer' on this occasion, and he was carrying 
a sandbag. 

"'What's in that sandbag, Ball? , asked a sub- 
altern, glad of anything to talk about. 

" 'Munitions, sir/ was the odd reply. 

" 'Your observer looks like doing a bit of bomb- 
ing on his own to-day/ remarked the subaltern to 
his commander. 

"The captain looked at his watch. A few sec- 
onds more, whistles sounded along the line and 
A Company was over the top. 'Tec-toc-toc-toc* 
went the German machine guns from both flanks. 
It was as the captain had feared, and the first 
line was almost swept away before reaching the 
German wire. The second and third lines faltered, 



A CHARLIE CHAPLIN GAIT 103 

stopped, and sought cover in shell holes. The 
captain, in the rear of the company, set his jaw 
very firmly. All his officers were down, but he 
knew that every man of his company within sight 
would follow him, and he meant to get those 
trenches. He took off his steel helmet, that all 
might more easily recognize him, and stalked slowly 
toward the enemy trench. Private Ball, with his 
sandbag, followed close behind. The line moved 
forward once more, and then the captain fell, 
shot through both thighs. Again the line faltered. 

"'Dunno as I cawn't get 'em on, sir," said 
Private Ball. 

" 'Try/ replied his officer. 

"Private Ball, opening his sandbag, knocked 
off his shrapnel helmet and put on the famous 
top hat. Then with a screw picket as a walking 
stick he advanced toward the German line, not 
with the dignified stride of the captain, but with 
the sidelong gait which has placed Mr. Charles 
Chaplin at the head of his profession. 

"It was one of the things that win battles. 
Every man who could see the hat through the 
smoke of shell bursts went forward behind it. 



io 4 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

The white plume of King Henry of Navarre was 
never more gallantly followed than was this old 
top hat, the property of a French maire. 

"Before he lost consciousness Captain Merring- 
ton knew that A Company had reached its objec- 
tive. 

"Private Ball did not come out of the fray un- 
scathed. While he was convalescing, he wrote 
the following letter to his captain, who was still 
in hospital, sending with it a bulky package : 

" Sir: 

I am sending you a top hat, the same I made the com- 
pany laugh with on parade, for which I am sorry, as I 
thought you would like it as a sooveneer of the scrap. 
The Bodies was surprised to see me in a top hat, I think. 
They only hit me once, which was in the shoulder, and it 
is nearly well. Thank you very much for sending my 
name in for that bit of ribbon, you being so ill at the time, 
and which is more than I should have got by rights. 
Hoping this finds you better, as it leaves me, I am, 
"Yours very respectfully 

"No. 2271, Private Ball." 



JUST AMERICAN FORTITUDE 

ONE morning in October, 191 7, an American 
destroyer got a wireless despatch. It 
was from the American merchant steamer 
/. L. Luckenbach. It said that a submarine was 
shelling the Luckenbach, and asked for help. 

a We are coming," said the destroyer, in effect. 

"How long will it take you?" asked the mer- 
chantman. 

"About two hours," said the destroyer. 

"It will be too late," the other ship responded. 

"Don't surrender," said the destroyer. 

"Never," said the Luckenbach. 

It was more than two hours before the destroyer 
came into action. The merchantman had fought 
superbly and was still fighting. Its guns were 
commanded by a simple naval seaman, not even 
a warrant officer — but he has since received that 
rank. The submarine fired 225 shots; the Lucken- 
bach, 202. 

105 



106 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

The American ship was hit over and over again; 
it was afire between decks; one shot had put the 
after guns out of commission; men were wounded 
and men were killed — and still the ship fought on. 

The battle had raged for four hours. At 11.30 
the destroyer fired its first shot and the submarine 
submerged. The battered and helpless /. L. 
Luckenbach was saved, repaired, and escorted into 
port. 



FELL TO EARTH— RESCUED— ALOFT 
AGAIN 

ON AUGUST 24, 191 5, two airplanes left a 
French airdrome at Chalons and passed 
over the German lines. One machine 
contained the veteran Adjutant Boyer and an 
officer observer; the other was piloted by Sergeant 
Bertin, who accompanied the adjutant as an escort 
and protector. 

At a height of eleven thousand feet they were 
dodging the enemy shells, which were exploding 
on all sides of the two airplanes, when immediately 
in front of Adjutant B oyer's machine a black 
burst tilled the air with flying missiles, and Bertin, 
from above, saw his companion's airplane falling 
out of control straight down into the Hailly woods. 
He cut off his engine and dived after his 
friend, braving the increasing storm of lead as he 
drew nearer the ground. No landing place ap- 
peared among the trees below. The crippled 
• 107 



108 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

airplane fell heavily into the tree-tops and lodged 
there. Repassing the spot at a low level, Bertin 
saw his two friends scrambling out of their wrecked 
machine, apparently uninjured. He saw the 
officer observer quickly descend to the ground, 
where he destroyed his maps and papers, and then 
set off at a run to hide from pursuit. At the same 
moment a mass of flames appeared in the tree-tops. 
Boyer had set fire to the wreckage before descend- 
ing the tree. 

German soldiers were running through the woods 
from several directions toward the wrecked air- 
plane to make certain of the capture of the two 
Frenchmen. 

Bertin, with instant decision, cut off his motor, 
and, quickly choosing the most favorable spot in 
the vicinity, dropped down through the trees 
and landed amid the bushes on the rough ground. 
He shouted to Boyer to come to him. Boyer 
answered, and came running through the forest 
with a score of German riflemen shooting at his 
heels. Restarting the engine with one swing on 
the propeller, Boyer jumped into his friend's 
airplane amid a shower of bullets, and coolly 



FELL TO EARTH 109 

turned and pointed the machine gun on his pur- 
suers. Gradually the airplane accumulated speed, 
lurched through the rough brush until it rose from 
the ground, and, guided by the heroic Bertin, 
glided between the branches of the overhanging 
trees and soared nobly away into the free air. 
The two friends passed safely through the enemy's 
fire and ultimately regained their own lines, where 
both pilots were welcomed by their comrades 
with kisses and cheers. Each of these intrepid 
airmen subsequently received decorations and 
generous citations in official reports for this 
remarkable exploit. 



THE U-BOAT THAT ESCAPED A TRAP 

WRITTEN especiaUy from the German 
viewpoint, the following story of how 
a German submarine was lured into a 
trap and narrowly escaped destruction, as told by 
Die Illustrirte Zeitung, suggests the deduction 
that if this boat had such a series of hairbreadth 
escapes, many other submarines must have been 
much less lucky: 

At midday the watch reported a tank-steamer 
sailing directly toward the submarine from an 
E.N.E. direction. Her masts, bridge, and funnel 
could be seen above the horizon. Tank steamers 
are very tough, because they have strong bulk- 
heads to protect their precious cargo; a torpedo 
must hit the engines, placed at the stern, and then 
the vessel is done for. The submarine dare only 
show a small part of the periscope above the water, 
and then only for a very short space of time. 
The torpedo was fired at a distance of 700 yards, 



U-BOAT THAT ESCAPED A TRAP in 

but the steamer was going at a greater pace than 
had been allowed for, and there was no explosion. 
A miss was recorded. Then she turned right 
round, and started setting her course in the oppo- 
site direction. When she had gone some little 
distance, the U-boat emerged and fired a shot from 
her quick-firing gun as a signal to halt. The 
steamer understood; she let down two boats, into 
which the crew descended. A tall white column 
of steam was blown off. The captain seemed to 
be a reasonable sort of man, and not anxious to 
fight desperately and hopelessly against shell fire. 
The submarine came alongside, submerged, and 
viewed the vessel; she was a black tank steamer 
with gray superstructure, unarmed, with the usual 
patent log trailing from her stern. 

Then the U-boat turned her attention to the 
small boats, the men in which, when they saw 
the periscope approaching, rowed quickly away. 
At last the submarine was able to emerge safely 
in a favorable position beyond the boats, but 
keeping them well within range of her guns. 
Blowing out her midship ballast, she emerged, 
and the conning tower was opened. The boats 



ii2 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

had already been rowed a little farther, when 
suddenly, just as they were being hailed, there 
was a flash from the steamer. 

"Submarine trap!" sounded the alarm. "Sub- 
merge quickly." 

The moments passed like lightning. A shell 
hit the after part of the conning-tower super- 
structure, and no sooner was the hole stopped up 
than there was a yellow flash, and explosive gases 
poisoned the air. A shell had penetrated the 
conning tower and exploded inside. Splinters 
were flying in all directions, and instruments and 
panes of glass were shattered. In a moment 
another shell would follow, and that would be an 
end of war forever! Water was splashing through 
the shell hole, the conning tower was cleared, the 
lower hatch closed, the cocks of the speaking- 
tubes shut off, the submarine was conned from the 
lower position, and sank into the sheltering 
deep. 

"Is any one in the conning tower wounded?" 

One had a scratch, but their faces were black, 
and the uniforms a sight to behold. 

At a depth of ten fathoms the boat quivered 



U-BOAT THAT ESCAPED A TRAP 113 

at two sharp explosions. The "poor shipwrecked 
crew" had thrown two water bombs behind them. 
Some lamps went out. Further mischief was 
prevented by the rapid closing of the watertight 
bulkheads. 

The conning tower was full. Theoretically a 
submarine can still proceed in this plight, but as 
yet there is no man living who can confirm that 
theory from his own experience. Owing to the 
ever-increasing pressure of the water the boat 
sank to a depth of twenty fathoms, though every 
ounce possible was got out of the engines. 

Water rushed through every crack that was not 
watertight. One after another important parts 
of the machinery refused to work — the compass, 
main steering gear, the forward diving rudders 
(which had also stuck fast down below), and the 
trimming pumps. An attempt was made to get 
the submarine horizontal by emptying two of the 
diving tanks aft in order to make her lighter. 
She rose a little, but the load of water in her stern 
grew heavier and heavier, and the stern blow-off 
valves went wrong. It was impossible to come 
right to the surface, for the enemy was waiting 



ii 4 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

above to fire at her. At a depth of ten fathoms 
all the crew available were sent forward in order 
to press her bows down with their weight. The 
boat dipped astern and sank, and the whole 
manoeuvre had to be repeated. 

In twenty minutes it was found that it was im- 
possible to steer submerged, and the only hope 
appeared to be to emerge, fire, and get away. 
The order was given : 

"Pressure on all the tanks, man the guns, let 
the engines run clear, and full speed ahead." 

In the galley stood a bucket containing the 
fish that had been caught that morning. They 
would not be wanted now. 

The submarine emerged, and the hatch under 
the conning tower was opened. A perfect torrent 
of water poured in; but that did not matter, all 
were prepared to swim sooner or later. Now the 
way was clear. The steamer was some couple of 
miles away, now, firing as she went. 

"You — you have not got us yet by a long way," 
said the U-boat, quickly returning fire; but whether 
the shots were successful it could not tell, as the 
^lass of the periscope lay in the water-logged 



U-BOAT THAT ESCAPED A TRAP 115 

conning tower. The engines were set at high 
speed — far higher than they ought to have been 
— but when the last card is at stake. . . . 

Those of the crew who were not occupied below 
busied themselves by carrying shells to the guns. 
The lieutenant suddenly felt his feet blown side- 
ways — a yard apart; in a cloud of smoke he stag- 
gered against the gun. The crew thought the 
poor fellow would have had both his legs blown 
off, but marvelously enough he was only hit by 
a few splinters. The shell had passed between 
the legs of the gunner of the forward gun, the 
detonation shattering his ear-drum. The reserve 
ammunition showed a considerable amount of 
damage. Shells were dashing in among the crew. 
A rail was blown away. A sailor from Leipzig 
sat in the stern calmly steering with the hand- 
rudder according to the verbal instructions of the 
helmsman, the compasses being now out of gear. 

By this time it was possible to raise the peri- 
scopes out of the conning tower, "Destroyer of 
St. Bride's," was announced. Right! There she 
was, the shells from her four guns mingling with 
those from the tank steamer. 



n6 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

This type of destroyer could do thirty knots 
an hour, and carried guns of 4-inch caliber. The 
order came : i c Change round to a westerly course . ' ' 

The gunners were so deafened by the noise of 
their own guns that it was now only possible ver- 
bally to direct the firing of one gun. The steamer 
was so far gone that it was not necessary to fire 
at her any more, so attention was turned to the 
new foe. This was no ordinary destroyer, but 
a U-boat destroyer of the Foxglove class, about 
twice as big as the U-boat, but not quicker. At 
this moment the second mechanic announced that 
he could repair the damaged conning tower; 
hopes rose beyond all expectation. 

"Fire! — Range 4,oco — Deflection 4 left." 

Soon the towering water columns raised by the 
shells were close by the target, and the enemy 
began to try to avoid them by taking a zigzag 
course; by so doing he impaired the accuracy of his 
own guns. Suddenly black smoke began to rise 
from his superstructure. 

A hit! Then another! Some of the shells 
raised no columns of water; no doubt they were 
buried in the hull of the destroyer. Then the 



U-BOAT THAT ESCAPED A TRAP 117 

enemy craft turned round and steamed out of the 
fire zone, following in the wake of the submarine. 
The final damage was repaired, ammunition 
placed in order near the guns, and the U-boat 
waited, like Wellington at Waterloo, for the night. 



ONLY HALF A COW WAS THERE 

A STORY current among a Liverpool bat- 
talion, recorded by E. G. Miles, in "The 
Soul of the Ranker" (Hodder & Stough- 
ton), may be cited as an example of the comedy 
elements that interpose themselves and provide 
interludes between the continuing tragedy of 
trench warfare. It was told against a popular 
quartermaster, and began when someone in 
billets in Belgium said it would be great to have 
real milk — uncondensed — for a change. A private 
who had been on guard declared that during the 
evening he had seen a cow in a field about 500 
yards away and near the enemy trenches. 

"Well, I'll take a bucket," said the sergeant, 
"and I'll milk that cow myself." 

So at the risk of his life he started off at midnight 
on his quest for uncondensed. Before a hundred 
yards had been covered he was waist-deep in a 

water-filled shell crater and the bucket had 

118 



HALF A COW WAS THERE 119 

fallen into the mud. The splash had roused the 
enemy sniper. Shot after shot came whizzing 
through the night air. Then a flare went up, 
and his only chance was to duck under for a few 
seconds. As he emerged he heard a sharp metallic 
bang, and then the firing ceased. After a long 
wait he waded out and found his bucket battered 
with German bullets and not fit to carry even 
condensed milk tins, to say nothing of milk un- 
condensed. After a quarter of an hour he came 
to the spot. There was a barn silhouetted in the 
semi-darkness, the roof and one side missing, and 
through the shell holes he could see distinctly 
the head and horns of a cow. So a moment of 
careful striding brought him round, and there was 
the cow — the forepart standing out of the half 
door hanging limply over, and the hindpart gone 
with the shell that blew in the side of the barn. 
It was said he brought back the bucket as a souve- 
nir. 



CAPTURING A SUBMARINE SINGLE- 
HANDED 

ROLLING slowly on the cold gray swells 
of the English Channel, westward over a 
h certain number of miles of waves, then 
back eastward over the same miles, steaming 
steadily to and fro like a policeman over a lonely 
beat, a trawler was patrolling monotonously, 
the young lieutenant who commanded her scan- 
ning the tossing surface about him as a detective 
scans the faces of a crowd. 

Nothing relieved the monotony of the rhythmic 
rise and fall of the boat and the westward and east- 
ward patrol except an occasional British or French 
cruiser and the regular exchange of signals with 
other patrolling trawlers as either end of the 
beat was reached. 

The young lieutenant had plenty of time to 
growl inwardly at his luck. Why was he not on 
some great battleship where there was at least 



CAPTURING A SUBMARINE 121 

room to stretch his legs, where one could keep 
dry, and where there was some slight chance of 
battle, instead of on this bobbing tub where there 
was not room to whip a cat, where every wave 
drenched all on board with spray, and where there 
was never a show for any sort of fight? What 
opportunity was there here to do anything that 
might win promotion, higher pay, a medal, a few 
days' leave? He had entered the Navy because 
he wanted to have a part in the righting and here 
he was doing the work of a marine policeman! 

A white streak — different, to his practised eye, 
from the white streaks of breaking waves — tore 
through the water, coming straight toward him. 

A shock! and it seemed as if an earthquake had 
struck the trawler. An explosion smashed her to 
bits in an instant, and the young lieutenant found 
himself swimming, with bits of wreckage and dying 
men about him. 

Slipping out of the hampering folds of his great 
coat, he swam. He saw some of his men seize 
bits of wreckage and drift away. He saw the 
mangled bodies of others bob up for an instant in 
the trough of a wave. There seemed no piece 



122 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

of wreckage big enough to support him. But 
he was a strong swimmer and he kept afloat. He 
did not know in what direction he was swimming; 
he just swam. 

Suddenly his feet struck something solid. He 
pushed back on it and gave himself a forward 
spurt, but as he extended his feet backward again 
they touched that solid submerged something a 
second time. He rested his feet against it, and it 
seemed like a great smooth rock. But it was 
moving! It was coming up under him! 

"The submarine that sank us!" This thought 
flashed into the swimmer's mind. 

Turning quickly in the water, he saw already 
above the surface a pair of periscopes and the top 
of a conning tower, with the deep sea water stream- 
ing down them as they rose. 

He ceased swimming instantly, and braced his 
feet upon the slippery solid, which he knew, now, 
was the deck of the U-boat that had just sent his 
vessel and crew to the bottom. As it came up 
he came up with it. A few seconds more, and the 
conning tower was out of water and the decks 
awash. 



CAPTURING A SUBMARINE 123 

The eye of the lieutenant was fixed upon a little 
trap-door, expecting every instant to see it open 
and the head of the German Commander emerge. 
He drew his Colt Automatic pistol from its case 
and pointed it at the door. [The modern Naval 
pistols are waterproof.] 

Scarcely were the waves pouring off the glisten- 
ing steel of the deck that was now above the sur- 
face than the door swung open and the face of a 
German officer appeared. The Automatic pistol 
barked once and the German lurched forward. 
Springing upon him like a cat, the young Briton 
seized the body of the enemy, that it might not be 
drawn back down the ladder and so make it possi- 
ble to close the door and submerge again. He had 
aimed to kill and had made a bull's eye. 

The body blocked the closing of the door. 
Still holding his pistol pointed toward the single 
exit, he squatted upon the shoulders of the dead 
commander, whose legs dangled down the ladder 
and might be pulled in by the crew below. 

He waited for the second head to emerge. 
There were ^ve shots still left in the magazine 
of his pistol, and he planned that five more Ger- 



i2 4 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

mans should die. They must come up in single 
file. The doorway was so narrow that there was 
not room for more than one at a time. 

He squatted and waited, holding his pistol 
pointed through the open doorway, which could 
not be closed because it was blocked by the body 
on which he sat. 

Minutes passed. Still the second head did not 
appear. Would they rush him? Would they wait 
till he was too stiff with cold and wet to shoot 
straight? He thought of what the Germans 
below must be discussing. There were enough of 
them to overpower him if they could get at him. 
They could not know how many cartridges he 
had in reserve. They must know that the first 
frve at least who came up would be killed. Were 
there fivG of them brave enough to commit suicide? 
For coming up the ladder would be sure death. 

And still he waited. He expected they would 
rush him, and he was ready. But nothing hap- 
pened. All was silent except for the splash of 
the choppy waves on the metal deck of the man- 
made sea monster. 

Minute after minute passed. The tension was 



CAPTURING A SUBMARINE 125 

great, and the lieutenant lost all track of time. 
Motionless and wet, he began to feel numb. But 
his right hand holding his pistol never shook, 
and he never took his eye off the doorway. 

After an interminable wait he became aware 
of a stream of smoke over the waves. Turning 
his eyes away from the doorway for an instant 
he saw a British destroyer darting swiftly through 
the water and coming in his direction. He stood 
up and waved his hand. A toot from the whistle 
informed him that he had been seen. 

In a few minutes the destroyer was alongside. 
The lieutenant, amid the cheers of the destroyer's 
crew, turned over to its commander the prize 
that he, single-handed, had captured intact, with 
all her crew, save the one dead officer, as prisoners. 
The Victoria Cross was his reward. 

[The narrator of the above story stated that he 
had obtained the facts from "A British Naval 
Officer of high rank " who recently visited America. 
The identity of the hero has been concealed.] 



FLIERS MUST ALSO BE FLEET FOOTED 

MANY American aviators, serving under 
the French flag, were aloft at the great 
battle of Picardy which the Germans 
opened by a drive against the Allied lines in the 
early spring of 1918. Among them was a young 
American of twenty- two, Sergeant Frank Baylies, 
of New Bedford, Mass., a member of France's 
most famous air-chasing squadron, the "ace" 
Escadrille. This group of sky fighters was ordered 
to Montdidier at the opening of the conflict and 
here an adventure, typical of the vicissitudes of 
war common to airmen, befell Baylies. 

"We made three or four sorties daily," said 
this aviator, describing his experiences. "We 
were surprised at the small number of German 
machines we encountered. Our work consisted 
principally of attacking enemy troops, supply 
convoys, etc., with machine guns. 

"Five days after our arrival there we were forced 
126 



FLIERS MUST BE FLEET FOOTED 127 

to leave Montdidier. The order to evacuate the 
field via the air came at noon. Two hours later 
an English battery was in action on the field. At 
3 o'clock the Boches arrived. One pilot whose 
machine was out of fix and who stopped to repair 
it took the air just as the Huns approached and 
was followed in his somewhat hurried flight by a 
vain shower of bullets." 

When the town was captured by the enemy the 
airmen managed to remove all the machines and 
camions, but several fliers lost the greater part of 
their personal effects. Baylies was more fortu- 
nate. 

Throughout the French retirement the airmen 
cooperated with the infantry and made three 
patrol flights — averaging from an hour and a half 
to two hours' duration — daily. As the German 
attacks were made almost without artillery or 
airplanes — for whole days no enemy planes were 
sighted — the fliers devoted themselves to harassing 
enemy infantry and convoys on the march. 

Flying often as low as sixty-eight feet, airmen 
turned mitrailleuses point-blank on the enemy, 
who fled headlong or threw themselves flat to 



128 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

escape the stream of bullets. When convoys were 
attacked, horses plunging madly in death agony 
threw the whole line into confusion. 

At such an altitude the aviator was greatly 
exposed to the fire of the German infantry, and 
injury to the motor forced an immediate landing, 
as the height was insufficient for a long volplane. 
On March 28th Baylies was thus downed near 
Mesnil-St. Georges. 

"I had been annoying Fritz all morning/ ' he 
said, "and having a wonderful time when I 
spotted a body of infantry moving toward Tickish 
Wood just after luncheon. As I dived upon them 
over the trees, quickfirers concealed there riddled 
my machine with bullets. My impetus luckily 
carried me a little farther into a grassy field, just 
between the two armies, where I landed not too 
abruptly. 

"Unfortunately I was barely fifty feet from the 
Boches and nearly a hundred yards from the 
French. At this point there were no trenches 
and both sides fought in the open, the Germans 
advancing in small groups from thicket to thicket 
and taking cover wherever possible. As they 



FLIERS MUST BE FLEET FOOTED 129 

saw me falling the enemy began firing furiously 
and a party of five Germans ran out to intercept 
me. A French Alpine Chasseur shot one dead 
and an infantry quickfirer drove the rest to cover. 
Just the same, I never covered a hundred yards 
faster in my life with bullets buzzing around me 
like angry wasps. 

"The French cheered in delight when I threw 
myself down among them unhurt. I stayed with 
them till night and saw them make a counter-attack 
that afternoon, when they advanced two kilo- 



meters." 



SAVED HIS FOE'S WIFE 

ONE of our soldiers brought with him a 
German officer who could hardly stand. 
His leg had been pierced by a bayonet, 
his shoulder was bleeding from a bullet, and his 
arm had been bruised by the butt end of a rifle. 
He was losing consciousness from pain and loss of 
blood. As soon as the soldier led him to our place 
he dropped with his whole weight on the stretcher. 
The doctor bandaged him, exclaiming: "What 
luck! Three wounds, and in spite of all of them 
he will be well soon. The wound in the leg is 
only a flesh wound, his arm is badly bruised but 
not broken, and only his collar bone at his shoulder 
is broken. In a month he will be all right again. 
Just look! What a handsome fellow, and what 
expensive underwear !" 

The bandaged officer came to himself, looked 
round the yard, and, seeing the farmhouse in the 

background on fire, he sharply seated himself. 

130 



SAVED HIS FOE'S WIFE 131 

"Now be quiet, calm yourself/' said the doctor, 
speaking in German and taking the man gently 
by the shoulders. 

"My wife, my wife!" cried the German, tearing 
himself forward. 

"Where is the wife?" 

" There, in the house, in the fire ! " He made an 
effort to get off the stretcher from under the doc- 
tor's hands. 

"Is he delirious or what?" muttered the doctor 
in Russian. "There is no one in the house," he 
added soothingly in German. "Your German 
wounded were there, but they were saved in time." 

"But my wife? My wife!" cried the captive 
in terror. 

"What wife? How did she come here?" 

1 ' She is a nurse. She was here with the wounded. 
We loved each other. We married only a year ago. 
She became a nurse. Our regiment happened to 
be near their hospital. Your offensive was unex- 
pected. There was no time to remove the hospital. 
The other nurses left, but she would not leave 
when I was so near. Where is she? My wife ! " 

"Did any one see a German nurse in the house 



i 3 2 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

or yard?" asked the doctor, turning to the Russian 
soldiers and telling them briefly what the prisoner 
had said. 

"There was no woman," came the response. 
"The house was empty. Look at the fire within. 
Even mice would have run out by now." 

At this moment something metallic shrilled 
through the air above our heads. A heavy 
German shell flew over us. 

"Scoundrels!" cursed the doctor. "They are 
firing on us — and their own wounded. We must 
get out of this. Two or three more shells and 
they will begin dropping in the yard. Carry our 
wounded first, then theirs. Hurry, or we shall 
remain here for eternity!" 

The captive officer, apparently powerless, could 
not rise from the stretcher, where he was lying 
with one of his soldiers who had been wounded 
before him. He gazed devouringly at the blazing 
house. Suddenly he shouted savagely: 

"There, at the window, under the roof! Look, 
she is breaking the window — where the smoke is 
pouring out!" 

We looked at the roof of the blazing house, 



SAVED HIS FOE'S WIFE 133 

and, in truth, there was a woman's figure in white, 
with a red cross on her breast. The doctor 
shouted: 

"Eh, fellows, it is true! A woman was left in 
the house — a nurse — his wife!" 

"What can be done?" asked the stunned sol- 
diers. "The whole house is on fire, and she is not 
strong enough to break through the window pane. 
She must be weak from fright. But why did she 
go up? Why not down?" 

"There's no guessing," shouted a bearded 
fellow, evidently from the reserves, throwing off 
his overcoat. 

"Where are you going?" cried the soldiers. 

But he was already out of reach of their voices. 
He rushed into the house. All were stupefied, 
fearing to breathe. A minute passed; another; a 
third. Then at the window appeared the bearded 
face of the Russian soldier. There came the sound 
of broken glass and wood. Above our heads 
something was shrilling, but no one paid attention 
to the German shells. The soldier broke the 
window and dragged the woman into the open air. 
She was unconscious. 



i 3 4 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

"Catch!" rang from above; and a big white 
parcel came down. The soldiers caught it suc- 
cessfully on the hero's outspread overcoat. Only 
one of them was hurt in the eye by the heel of her 
shoe. 

"How will our chap get back to us now?" asked 
the soldiers of one another. "It is hell inside." 

"Oh, he will get out all right," said someone. 
"It is easier to get out than to get in. He knows 
the way. And if he burns some of his beard, no 
harm, he has a large one." 

" Carry her to her husband," ordered the doctor, 
"and get out from here immediately. The Ger- 
mans are shelling us. Take away the rest and 
don't forget the couple," the doctor jokingly added, 
happy over the incident. "I will wait for our 
hero. He may be burned." 

The soldiers caught the remaining stretchers 
and nearly ran out of the yard. At that moment 
a big German shell struck the burning house. 
A deafening explosion shook the air. The walls 
trembled, shook, and fell. The heroic soldier had 
not had time to get out. He remained buried 
under the ruins. 



SAVED HIS FOE'S WIFE 135 

When the woman recovered consciousness near 
her wounded husband she did not understand 
where she was. She murmured in perplexity: 
"Dream, death? Otto, is that you? Are we 
together in Heaven?" 

"On earth and both alive," calmed the doctor. 

"How did you get to the upper story?" asked 
the husband. 

"I saw Russian soldiers run into the house. I 
feared violence, so I ran upstairs. I thought I 
would run down later, but then came the fire. 
. . . A soldier appeared behind me and I was 
terrified to death." 

"But that soldier saved you," sighed the doctor. 

"How? Where is he?" 

"In Heaven, if there is such a place for heroes." 

The doctor then told them all. The German 
officer and his wife both cried. 

"But how was it that your guns were firing at a 
farm which you were occupying?" suddenly asked 
the prisoner. 

"Our guns?" exclaimed the doctor, who was 
already bandaging a new victim. "It was your 
guns that were shelling a house which flew a 



136 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

German Red Cross flag. Our soldiers were sav- 
ing the lives of your wounded, and your guns were 
firing at both ours and yours. They killed the 
man who saved you. That's the way the Kaiser 
makes war." 



SAFE UNDER AN EXPLODING MINE* 



T 



HE roaring breakers made so much noise 
that we could hear them through the 

-** thick metal wall. Every new onrushing 
wave tossed us higher and higher on the reef. 
Exposure was our greatest danger. Already the 
top of the conning tower and the prow projected 
over the surface; but a moment more and the 
entire boat would be plainly visible. Then we 
would surely be lost. As a helpless wreck we 
would become a target for the destroyer. 

"Fill the ballast tanks," I called down to the 
"Centrale." "Fill the tanks full, Herr Engineer. 
Do you hear? We must not, under any circum- 
stances, rise any higher." 

The filling of the tanks had the desired effect. 
The boat lay down heavily on the reef and spurred 
the wild waves to greater efforts, and, though we 

*Copyright by The Century Co. 

137 



138 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

did not rise any farther, the jolting increased in 
violence because of its added weight. 

The mate, who over my shoulder was keeping 
watch on the destroyer through the window on 
the port side, suddenly said, in his hearty Saxon 
dialect: 

"He is turning !" 

Was it possible that he did not see us, when, 
according to my estimation, he was only about 
eight hundred meters away? Could the mate 
be right, and the foolish destroyer have only 
searched the passage according to his schedule? 
He was right. 

The valves were quickly opened. At once the 
boat came up. The terrific jolting ceased. The 
hand of the manometer moved upward, and, after 
a few seconds, the boat's broad, dripping back 
broke through the surface. 

There is the buoy! Now full speed ahead! 
We'll soon be there — now but a few hundred 
meters more and then the game is ours — a game 
on which life and death depended — a game which 
would have turned our hair white if we had not 
been so young. 



SAFE UNDER AN EXPLODING MINE 139 

As soon as we had placed ourselves on the 
right side of the longed-for buoy we again hurled 
ourselves deep down into the cool sea as 
happily as a fish which, after being for a long 
time on dry land, suddenly gets into his own 
element again. . . . 

This day continually brought us fresh surprises, 
so that, at last, we had a gruesome feeling that 
everything had united itself for our destruction. 

At a distance of five hundred meters a scouting 
fleet was moving about. At the same time on our 
starboard bow a French torpedo boat with four 
funnels was cruising around. 

I had a desire to fire a shot at this enemy, 
but the fact that such a shot would send the 
whole lurking fleet at us restrained me. I have 
to admit that it was hard to hold back from 
taking the chance, and it was with a heavy heart 
that I gave orders to dive again. 

But this, however, saved us. If we had traveled 
at the periscope level for only a few minutes more, 
I would not be sitting here to-day, smoking my 
cigar and writing down the story of our adventures. 

We were submerging, and the manometer 



i 4 o SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

showed seventeen meters. Then, suddenly, it 
was as if someone had hit each one of us at the 
same minute with a hammer. We all were uncon- 
scious for a second and found ourselves on the 
floor or thrown prone in some corner with our 
heads, shoulders, and other parts of our bodies 
in great pain. The whole boat shook and trem- 
bled. Were we still alive or what had happened? 
Why was it so dark all around us? The electric 
lights had gone out. 

"Look at the fuse !" 

"It's gone!" 

"Put in the reserve fuse!" 

Suddenly we had our lights again. All this 
within a few seconds. 

What had happened? Would the water rush 
into the ship and pull us to the bottom? It 
must be a mine — a violent mine detonation had 
shaken us close by the boat. 

Then the boat unexpectedly began to list. 
The bow sank, and the stern rose. The ship 
careened violently, although the diving rudder 
was set hard against this. 

Groning, who was in charge of the diving 



SAFE UNDER AN EXPLODING MINE 141 

rudder, shouted: "Something has happened. 
The boat does not obey the rudder. We must have 
got hooked into some trap — a mine or may be 
a net." 

' ' Listen/ ' I called down. ' ' We must go through 
it. Put the diving rudder down hard. Both 
engines full speed ahead! On no condition must 
we rise! All round us are mines." 

The engines were going at top speed. The 
boat shot upward and then bent down, ripped into 
the net, jerked, pulled, and tore and tore until 
the steel net gave way from the force of the attack. 

" Hurrah ! We are through it ! The boat obeys 
her diving rudder!" Groning called from below. 
"The U-202 goes on her way!" 

"Down, keep her down all the time. Dive 
to a depth of fifty meters," I commanded. " This is 
a horrible place — a real hell." 

I bent forward and put my head into my 
hands. It was rocking as if being hit by a trip 
hammer. My forehead ached as if pricked with 
needles, and my ears buzzed so that I had to 
press my fingers into them. 

It took some time for me to remember chrono- 



i 4 2 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

logically what had happened. Yes, it certainly 
was lucky that we, at the right moment, had 
submerged deep. We had been at a depth of 
about seventeen meters when our prow collided with 
the net and the detonation followed. The more I 
thought of it the plainer everything became. 

As we had run against the net it had stretched 
and that had set off the mine. The mines are 
set in the nets at the height at which the U-boats 
generally travel, which is the periscope level. 
If we had tried to attack the torpedo boat, or, for 
any other reason, had remained for a few minutes 
more at the periscope level, we would have run 
into the net at a point where our enemies had 
hoped we would — namely, so that the mine would 
have exploded right under us. Now, the mine, 
on the contrary, had exploded above us, and its 
entire strength went in the direction where the 
natural resistance was smallest — which was up- 
ward. Without causing us any greater damage 
than a fright and a few scars on the thin metal 
parts, which might have scratched the paint, we 
had escaped. (From "The Adventures of U-202 ,, 
by Baron Spiegel von und zu Peckelsheim.) 



HUNS FOUGHT ONE ANOTHER IN MID 

AIR 

AN "INCIDENT" said to be unique in the 

Zjk annals of aviation, and adequately sub- 

«*■ ■** stantiated later by official reports, amazed 

the members of the French Escadrille N-23 who 

witnessed it near Charmontois. 

Two French single-seater machines from Esca- 
drille N-23 were patrolling over the French lines 
at a height of eighteen thousand feet very early 
in the morning of May 10, 191 7. These fighting 
planes were piloted by Casale, an ace of great 
reputation, and Legendre, a less conspicuous pilot 
of this famous escadrille. 

Suddenly the Frenchmen perceived under their 
very noses, but some distance below them, a rare 
type of German airplane, containing pilot and 
observer, pursuing a leisurely path across the 
trenches into the French fines. The enemy ma- 
chine was quite safely above rifle fire and appeared 
to be wholly unprotected. 

143 



i44 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

Not crediting their senses for a time, the two - 
French scouts flew along above the Boche until 
he had passed so deep into French territory that 
he could not escape their attack, then they dropped 
closely behind him to get a look into this Hun 
mystery. It was no ordinary occasion to find a 
Boche airplane, unattended, flying behind French 
lines. 

Casale, who already had a list of seven enemy 
airplanes in his book, darted on to the stranger's 
tail and let go a dozen cartridges from his mi- 
trailleuse. It was enough. At a height of thir- 
teen thousand feet the German airplane wavered 
drunkenly for an instant, then fell over into a 
tail spin, and dropped like a stone. 

The two French pilots dropped swiftly after the 
falling Boche. They suspected the usual ruse 
which is practised by an antagonist to gain a little 
time and position when unexpectedly attacked. 
Sliding swiftly down alongside the whirling enemy, 
they witnessed a remarkable proceeding. 

The German observer had left his seat and was 
leaning back striking savagely with his fists at the 
face of his pilot. The machine was descending, 



HUNS FOUGHT IN MID AIR 145 

unpiloted and uncontrolled, faster and faster to a 
certain smash. 

Suddenly the pilot stood up in his cockpit, and, 
seizing his officer by the throat, lifted him up 
bodily and threw him headlong overboard into 
space. The rapid revolving of his machine aided 
him in the struggle and his antagonist offered 
slight resistance. 

The pilot gazed after the falling figure of his 
companion a moment, then grasped his controls 
— and just in time! At less than a thousand feet 
above the trees he brought his airplane out of the 
spin and managed to pancake it adroitly into the 
tree-tops. The machine slid backward through 
the branches, hurling the pilot forward as it fell. 

Landing as quickly as possible, Casale and his 
companion hastened to the wreckage. To their 
astonishment, they found the German pilot safe 
and sound. The officer observer was killed by 
the fall and was picked up some distance away. 
Upon investigation, it was discovered that he had 
been severely wounded in the first attack, several 
bullets having passed through his body. 

Upon being questioned about the quarrel with 



146 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

his officer, the captured pilot told Casale that he 
was Corporal Haspel and his observer was Lieuten- 
ant Schultz. He stated that his engine had been 
struck by Casale's shots and the motor stopped. 
He discovered that his officer had been severely 
wounded, though he himself was unhurt. He 
turned and attempted to volplane back to the 
German lines, which could easily have been 
reached, he said, from his high elevation. But 
Lieutenant Schultz, his superior officer, insisted 
that they surrender without further risk of attack. 
Haspel refused to obey. The officer, severely 
wounded as he was, reached back and struck the 
pilot several times with his fist. The pilot felt 
the officer's ringers around his throat and the 
airplane fell into a spin. Then, in sudden anger, 
Haspel seized the lieutenant, and, aided by the 
rapid whirling of the downward spin, flung him from 
the cockpit. Before he could regain complete 
control of his machine it crashed into the trees and 
was lost. Then, so incredible was it that he could 
not yet believe it, he found himself thrown clear 
of the wreck of his airplane, and, picking himself 
up, discovered that he was without a scratch! 



HUNS FOUGHT IN MID AIR 147 

But Casale, looking at the still trembling cor- 
poral, said ironically to himself, "I wonder, now, 
if Lieutenant Schultz was choking him for trying 
to escape, or was it for trying to surrender?" 

No answer was ever found to this riddle. 



AN ITALIAN RAID INTO AUSTRIAN 
WATERS 

Three Italian torpedo boats crossed the Adriatic 
on February 10, 1918, entered the Gulf of Quarnaro 
after nightfall, got into Buccari Harbor unperceived, 
sank a big Austrian transport there -at anchor, and 
escaped untouched. On one of them, commanded 
by Costanzo Ciano, were Luigi Rizzo, who had sunk 
the Austrian battleship Wien with one shot, and 
Gabriele d y Annunzio, the poet-airman, who had 
flown over the Austrian naval ports of Pola and 
C attar and bombed the vessels lying therein. DyAn- 
nunzio went to leave a jeering challenge to the Aus- 
trian navy. The following is his story of the 
daring raid, translated and much condensed by 
Arthur Benington, from the account dyAnnunzio 
wrote for the Corriere della Sera of Milan: 



o 



a 



N THE azure water I see our gray frigates 
with their bronze-muzzled torpedoes glis- 
tening, well greased. 

As a token for the enemy we are carrying 

148 



AN ITALIAN RAID 149 

three bottles, sealed and crowned wifh tricolored 
pennons. We shall leave them floating to-night, 
over there, in the cracked mirror of water among 
the debris and wreckage of the ships that we shall 
have struck. 

"In each of these is enclosed this jeering 
challenge: 

"To the shame of the very cautious Austrian fleet, occu- 
pied in its safe harbors with endlessly warming over the 
.little glory of Lissa, the sailors of Italy, laughing at every 
kind of net and barrier and ever ready to dare the undat- 
able, have come forth with fire and steel to startle prudence 
in its surest refuge. And a good comrade, well known to 
the Austrians — the chief enemy, the most inimical of all 
enemies, he of Pola and Cattaro — has come with them to 
mock at the price set upon his head. 

" We embark, we become taciturn and watchful. 
Each takes his post, and at his post he has little 
more room than he will have between the final 
planks. The harbor is limpid, just suffused with 
blue, as pure as the whites of a baby's eyes. 

"Commander Costanzo Ciano rejoins us while 
we are finishing taking on a supply of benzine. 
. . . With him we are sure to reach our goal. 
We are already masters of the Quarnaro as 



i S o SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

we steer into the track of the south wind in a calm 
over which broods an ever uniform haze. 

"The even course between sea and sky begins. 
Attention to every sign upon the sea. Attention 
to every sign upon the sky. If we were observed 
by an enemy ship or discovered by an aerial 
scout, we should have to give up the enterprise, 
for this is nothing if not a surprise." 

D'Annunzio here describes how they approached 
the shore and turned into the Gulf of Quarnaro 
and smelled the laurels on shore after sunset, 
how they ran unnoticed through the well-fortified 
Straits of Faresina and found themselves about 
midnight right in the Gulf of Fiume. His story 
thus proceeds: 

"The coast is crowned with lights. Reflections 
innumerable reach our wake and are shattered. 
All the haze has vanished. The Great Bear 
glistens extraordinarily above the black muzzle 
of the port gun. 

"*We increase our speed as we head toward the 
shore of Budcari. At about a mile's distance we 
slow down. The heights of Veglia are visible 
on our right. 



AN ITALIAN RAID 151 

"We have been at sea for fourteen hours, and 
for five hours we have been in the waters of the 
enemy; a handful of men on three tiny ships, alone, 
unescorted, far from our base, sixty miles from the 
most powerful of the imperial naval arsenals, 
a few miles from the frowning defences of Faresina, 
a few hundred yards from the batteries of Porto 
Re. An alarm, and we should be lost. 

" Silence is now our pilot. Our motors, running 
slow, seem an accompaniment of muted counter- 
basses. Meanwhile, Volpi is examining again the 
starboard torpedo, like a player who puts the neck 
of his violin against his cheek and adjusts the pegs. 

"We are skirting the coast at less than fifty 
yards' distance. It lies lightly upon a sea of oil. 
There is no moon, not an indication of life. Con- 
stanzo Ciano stands erect at the prow scanning 
the shore for the opening. 

"There it is! We are in the narrows. Mid- 
night passed thirty-five minutes ago. The boat 
is now nothing but keen-eyed, armed determina- 
tion. Are those nets? Are those barriers? We 
slow down. We try. No sort of obstructions. 
We skirt Cape Sersica and sail a few yards from 



i 5 2 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

the western shore. Porto Re is dark. Vigilance 
is asleep. The battery is silent. 

"'Good fellows, these Austrians!' whispers 
Luigo Rizzo. 

"We are inside the enemy bay, right at the 
northern extremity of the gorge of Buccari, close 
to the anchorage, unobserved, unsuspected! 

"The Commander stands erect in the bows 
looking for the targets. The shapes of four steam- 
ships are outlined against the hills. Calm and 
silence. We approach still closer. Orders are 
spoken from boat to boat. Each prow takes out 
its position for firing. It is an hour and a quarter 
after midnight. 

"I have my bottles handy, ready for the joke — 
strong, black bottles, of thick glass, pot-bellied, 
with the message inside in a roll, written with my 
own hand in good ink. I prepared them myself, 
each with two strong corks and three long tricolored 
pennons fastened around their necks with pins and 
wax. 

"The heart leaps at the merry swish of the first 
torpedo that darts from its tube. One at the 
foremast; one amidships below the smokestack. 



AN ITALIAN RAID 153 

"The moments are an eternity. The bronze- 
nosed beast is heard snoring against the target, 
its screw moving and shaking up angry air, caught 
against a protective net. 

" One at the second's midships. 

" One at the midships of the third. 

"Again the great snoring and swirling under 
water against the hull, as when a whale strands 
on a shoal and blows and snorts and struggles. 

" Two at the smokestack of the fourth. 

"Both take the same route and reach the mark 
at the same point. The first succeeds in smashing 
the net, the second passes through the rent and 
explodes. 

"It is like an earthquake in a well-stocked 
crockery shop — a tremendous clatter. We see 
the dark mass heave over among some quivers of 
light. A confused cry, a scattered shouting, a 
lighting up and agitation of searchlights, a few 
shots here and there — the alarm! 

"I place the first bottle in the water. I drop 
the second on our return route before doubling 
the headland of Babri. I watch the third wabbling 
in our insolent wake as we issue from the narrows 



154 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

and head toward the mouth of the bay, passing 
under the battery of Porto Re, which lights up 
but does not thunder. 

"Outside, we inhale the stars as a smith inhales 
the sparks from his forge. The wind of our speed 
has the keenness of early spring. We try to 
preserve our formation, but the third torpedo 
boat loses speed and cannot keep up. 

" Suddenly from the heights of Prestenizze a 
volley of rifle fire bursts out. An outburst of 
raillery replies. We light the stern lantern and 
slow down, the third boat not being in sight. 

"A little before five the lights of the third tor- 
pedo boat shine through the haze as it rejoins its 
companions. Behind us we leave the rocks of 
Quarnaro. Our little square flag, fluttering like a 
hand, has its red turned toward Istria. From 
Italy, we voyage toward Italy." 



AN AUSTRIAN RAID INTO ITALIAN 
WATERS 

AS IF in retaliation for the Italian midnight 
Zjk raid into the Gulf of Quarnaro, in February, 
^ ML 191 8, the Austrians planned an ambitious 
raid on Ancona the following April. The Milan 
correspondent of the London Daily Chronicle 
tells the story of the adventure: 

"Its objective was threefold, namely, to blow 
up the submarine flotilla in Ancona Harbor, to 
destroy the captured Austrian torpedo boat B-n 
lying there, and to seize a naval motor-boat 
squadron. 

"The invading party left Pola at 4 o'clock in 
the afternoon on board the torpedo boat 6g, 
having a motor launch in tow and escorted by a 
destroyer. They headed for the Italian side of 
the Adriatic at a speed of sixteen miles an hour. 
When fifteen miles from land the invading detach- 
ment took their places in the motor launch, whose 

155 



156 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

engines b had been carefully covered to suppress 
noise. 

"Shortly after 2 o'clock in the morning they dis- 
embarked at a solitary spot on shore to find that 
owing to a big error in their calculations they were 
seventeen miles north of Ancona. Formidably 
armed with bombs, pistols, and daggers, and carry- 
ing twenty-five kilos of dynamite, they moved 
in rows four abreast along a road skirting the coast. 
Since all spoke fluent Italian with a Venetian 
accent and wore uniforms indistinguishable in 
the darkness from that of the Royal Italian 
Marines, they aroused no suspicion in the minds of 
coast guards and sentinels whom they passed 
and from whom they inquired the nearest route 
to Ancona, it being taken for granted, that they 
had disembarked from some friendly vessel lying 
off shore at daybreak. 

"Having sighted a lonely cottage of which 
the only occupants were one woman, two small 
children, and a big dog, they decided to seek 
refuge till evening. During the interval two ca- 
dets disguised as peasants were sent to Ancona 
to purchase necessaries and spy out defences and 



AN AUSTRIAN RAID 157 

the exact position of vessels in the port. The 
information which the spies brought back deter- 
mined the officers to forego a plan of blowing up 
the Mandracchio sugar factories, with other items 
of their programme, and to concentrate their efforts 
on capturing the motor-boat squadron, in which 
they could get away from danger as quickly as 
possible. At sundown they buried their dynamite 
in the cottage garden and at the stroke of midnight 
they started toward the town. 

"Mistaken for a naval patrol they experienced 
no difficulty in passing the toll-gates, but once 
well within the town they were betrayed by a 
comrade who, seeing a chance of deserting, slipped 
down a pitch-dark alley and informed an Italian 
squad of Carabinieri, who at once telephoned an 
alarm to headquarters. 

"Meantime only a long narrow passage skirting 
the sugar factory separated the raiders from a 
corner of the harbor, where the motor bo-ats lay at 
their moorings. The commanding officer, shout- 
ing out in imperative tones that he had orders 
to board the boats, successfully passed the first 
sentry, but farther on a second sentry, being some- 



158 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

what suspicious, silently followed them till one 
of the party turned and plunged a dagger into his 
breast, not, however, before he had time to give an 
alarm by firing his carbine. 

"This brought several sailors from a torpedo 
vessel hard by hurrying up, while from the opposite 
direction ten Carabinieri appeared on the scene. 
Then came swiftly a dramatic and ignominious 
ending. Armed to the teeth though they were 
with knives, revolvers, and hand bombs, the in- 
vaders simply threwup their hands in surrender.' ' 



FROM ONE LIVING TOMB TO ANOTHER 

FROM a correspondent with the American 
Army near Luneville, France, came this 
story of an entombed sergeant: 

The Boche had been shelling the position that the 
sergeant was in all day long. He had taken refuge in 
a dugout. It was hit by a shell and he was buried 
in the debris. The shelling continued so hot that 
his mates could not rescue him. Twenty-four 
hours later, with pick and shovel flying, they found 
him. 

To the surprise of everyone, the sergeant was 
still alive. He had been extricated down to the 
waist, his legs still being held fast in the dirt and 
concrete. The mud was wiped from his face and 
he was given a drink of water. His rescuers were 
hurrying up with more shovels and digging franti- 
cally to free him. He opened his eyes. 

"All right, boys; don't worry on my account 
and don't expose yourselves," he said. "I guess 

159 



160 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

I'm not hurt, and you don't want to take any 
chances." 

Just then another shell broke. A ton of earth 
caved in — with the sergeant beneath it. It is his 
grave. 



A GERMAN ATTACK— AND THE HEART 
IN A TREE 

A GERMAN attack suddenly interrupted 
a little musicale which had been impro- 
vised one morning in the schoolhouse at 
Montauville by a few poilus and Henry Sheahan, 
an American attached to an ambulance corps, 
to while away the time. 

"Shells were popping everywhere/ ' wrote Mr. 
Sheahan in "A Volunteer Poilu" (Houghton, 
Mifflin Company) ; "crashes of smoke and violence 
— in the roads, in the fields, and overhead. The 
Germans were trying to isolate the few detach- 
ments enrepos in the village, and prevent rein- 
forcements coming from Dieulouard or any other 
place. To this end all the roads between Pont-a- 
Mousson and the trenches, and the roads leading 
directly to the trenches, were being shelled. 

"'Goat once to Poste C 

"The winding road lay straight ahead, and 

161 



162 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

just at the end of the village street the Germans 
had established a tir de barrage. This meant 
that a shell was falling at that particular point 
about once every fifty seconds. I heard two 
rafales break there as I was grinding up the ma- 
chine. Up the slope of the Montauville hill 
came several of the other drivers. Tyler, of 
New York, a comrade who united remarkable 
bravery with the kindest of hearts, followed close 
behind me, also evidently bound for Poste C. 
German bullets, fired wildly from the ridge of 
The Wood over the French trenches, sang across 
the Montauville valley, lodging in the trees at 
Puvenelle behind us with a vicious tspt; shells 
broke here and there on the stretch leading to the 
Quart-en-Reserve, throwing the small rocks of 
the road surfacing wildly in every direction. The 
French batteries to our left were firing at the 
Germans, the German batteries were firing at 
the French trenches and the roads, and the 
machine guns rattled ceaselessly. I saw the 
poilus hurrying up the muddied roads of the slope 
of the Bois-le-Pretre — vague masses of moving 
blue on the brown wavs. A storm of shells was 



THE HEART IN A TREE 163 

breaking round certain points of the road and 
particularly at the entrance to The Wood. . . . 
Le Bois de la Mort (The Wood of Death) was sing- 
ing again. 

"That day's attack was an attempt by the 
Germans to take back from the French the eastern 
third of the Quart-en-Reserve and the rest of the 
adjoining ridge half hidden in the sheltered trees. 
. . . There was a glimpse of human beings in 
the Quart — soldiers in green, soldiers in blue. 
The very fact that anybody was to be seen there 
was profoundly stirring. Tyler and I watched 
for a second, wondering what scenes of agony, 
of heroism, of despair, were being enacted in that 
dreadful field by the ruined wood. 

"We hurried our wounded to the hospital, 
passing on our way detachments of soldiers mshing 
toward The Wood from the villages of the region. 
Three or four big shells had just fallen in Dieu- 
louard, and the village was deserted and horribly 
still. The wind carried the roar of the attack 
to our ears. In three quarters of an hour I was 
back again at the moorland poste, to which an 
order of the commander had attached me. Mon- 



i6 4 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

tauville was full of wounded. I had three on 
stretchers inside, one beside me on the seat, and 
two others on the front mud guards. And The 
Wood continued to sing. From Montauville I 
could hear the savage yells and cries which accom- 
panied the righting. 

"Half an hour after the beginning of the attack, 
the war invaded the sky with the coming of the 
German reconnoitring airplanes. One went to 
watch the roads leading to The Wood along the 
plateau, one went to watch the Dieulouard road, 
and the other hovered over the scene of the 
combat. The sky was soon dotted with the puffs 
of smoke left by the exploding shells of the special 
anti-aircraft ' seventy-fives. ' These puffs blos- 
somed from a pin-point of light to a vaporous, 
gray-white puff-ball about the size of the full 
moon, and then dissolved in the air or blew about 
in streaks and wisps. . . . 

"The Boche watching the conflict appeared 
to hang almost immobile over the Quart. With 
a striking suddenness another machine appeared 
behind him and above him. So unexpected was 
the approach of this second airplane that its ap- 



THE HEART IN A TREE 165 

pearance had the touch of the miraculous. It 
might have been created at that very moment in 
the sky. The Frenchman — for it was an aviator 
from the pare at Toul, since killed at Verdun, 
poor fellow — swooped beneath his antagonist and 
fired his machine gun at him. The German an- 
swered with two shots from a carbine. The 
Frenchman fired again. Suddenly the German 
machine flopped to the right and swooped down; 
it then flopped to the left, the tail of the machine 
flew up, and the apparatus fell, not so swiftly 
as one might expect, down a thousand feet into 
The Wood. When I saw the wreckage a few days 
afterward, it looked like the spilt contents of a 
waste-paper basket, and the aviators, a pilot 
and an observer, had had to be collected from all 
over the landscape. . . . 

"Just after this attack, a doctor of the ser- 
vice was walking through the trenches in which 
the French had made their stand. He noticed 
something oddly skewered to a tree. He knocked 
it down with a stone, and a human heart fell at 
his feet." 



THE RAID ON A GERMAN 
HEADQUARTERS 

IN THE Pinsk marshes," said a Russian soldier 
to H. Hamilton Fyfe, Petrograd correspon- 
dent of the London Daily Mail, " there is a 
little town called Nevel. Near this the Prussian 
general commanding the Eighty-second Division 
had made himself as comfortable as he could in a 
substantial country house. The house stands 
in a garden. There are no others quite near. 
Of course the staff of the Russian division which 
lay to the eastward knew all about it. . . ." 

This house and its occupants had inspired a 
young officer in charge of a scouting party with 
an idea. He knew the country. Among the 
swamps a small number of men might pass by 
paths, known only to the peasants, with such a 
secret movement as would escape the notice of any 
German outpost. The house, he learned, was not 
closely guarded; it would be some minutes before 

166 



RAID ON GERMAN HEADQUARTERS 167 

help could arrive. A kidnapping party would be 
hazardous; but he resolved to risk it, and a trust- 
worthy guide was obtained — one who knew every 
track across the marshes, even on a dark night. 

The night came solidly black, with a low sky 
from which scattered snowflakes fell. The scout- 
ing party was paraded. Without being told that 
anything special was their night's work, they 
started off ... on their fifteen-mile tramp 
across the bitter bogland. They were also taken 
now into their officer's confidence. 

At last, after hours of tramping through desola- 
tion, they saw lights far away. They were the 
fights of the little town. . . . They had 
crossed one river already. They had another to 
ford now. Then they would be close to the 
house. . . . 

Now they moved more carefully than ever. 
Beyond the Stokhod River they were among the 
enemy's detachments. . . . Here it was im- 
possible to hold a continuous front. The marshes 
prevented it. This marsh which the scouts had 
crossed seemed to the enemy to be uncrossable, 
and therefore a secure barrier. . . . 



i6S SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

There were no sentries outside the garden. 
The raiders got into it and had surrounded the 
house before they were noticed. Sentries back 
and front kept guard, unfearing. Suddenly death 
took them in the darkness. Before the life was 
out of the sentries the Russians were in the house. 

The teller of the story entered a room where a 
soldier sat with receivers over his ears sleepily 
waiting for a telephone message. This room was 
lighted up. The rest of the house seemed to be 
dark. The German soldier did not look round. 
He heard someone enter, but evidently thought it 
a comrade. 

There was a pause of half a minute. The house 
was so still that those who got into the telephone 
room felt doubtful what to do next. Death 
stood by the German soldier's elbow. Then a 
voice in the next room cried out sharply "Wer 
da ?" ("Who's that?"), and the German soldier's 
life was over. The telephone instrument was 
smashed at once. Next moment the whole place 
was in an uproar. 

Shots were fired. Shouts came from all sides. 
Soldiers appeared buckling their belts. All who 



RAID ON GERMAN HEADQUARTERS 169 

showed themselves to the scouts left outside the 
house were either bayoneted or bombed. The 
bursting of the hand grenades, the yells of the 
terrified Germans, the leaping flames of a fire 
started by an overturned lamp, the hoarse bellow- 
ing of orders which could not be obeyed, the hard 
breathing of those who were engaged in death- 
struggles within the house — all combined to make 
a scene wilder and grimmer than any that could be 
imagined. 

Now picture the general's bedroom. It was 
next to the room where the soldier with the tele- 
phone sat. 

"Our scouts," said the narrator, "running in, 
saw 'a man no longer young/ half dressed, just 
as he had lain down on the bed. Half asleep still, 
but sufficiently awake to be furiously angry, and 
very much rattled at the same time. A battle 
is one thing. To be kidnapped is quite another. 
A pitiable plight for 'one no longer young/ 

"No escaping this ignominious fate, however. 
Seized is the angry general and hustled out. With 
him three of his officers, of General rank, the 
headquarters doctor, a few privates. Hustled 



i 7 o SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

out through the garden, down the river bank, 
over the river; now they can go more gently. 
And now they hear the rattle of rifle fire. Assist- 
ance has arrived. They hear their men shouting. 
But they are beyond reach. 

" Those who had been left behind soon followed. 
The Germans were arriving in numbers too for- 
midable. Our scouts made for the river, crossed 
it, and were lost in the gloom of the farther bank. 
Only two were left behind with death wounds. 
Nine were slightly wounded. All got back safely 
before daylight with their prisoners." 



SHELLED IN AND SHELLED OUT 

SHELL-PROOF Mack"— a cognomen that 
an American actor, known as Arthur Mack, 
earned owing to his immunity from the 
perils of shells in fighting with the British on the 
western front — tells this story in his book of that 
name (Small, Maynard & Co.) of how he came to 
be so named: 

"It is the habit of the beastly Boche to select 
special occasions for his contributions of explosive 
hardware. On this Christmas Eve (191 6) Fritz 
didn't disappoint us at all, for about four o'clock 
in the afternoon he started his show. I was sitting 
on the fire-step when the shell came over that 
fixed our clocks. It must have been a big boy, 
because there was a terrible crash and the whole 
parapet for the space of at least twenty feet lifted 
and came in on us. I found myself buried up to 
the neck, but I had raised my hands, and they were 
sticking up in front of my face, although my arms 
were under. I was packed in as neat as you please. 

171 



172 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

I was not uncomfortably crushed, and naturally 
began to claw about and try to get my arms free. 
I'd have got completely out only I was saved the 
trouble. 

"I'd been digging for two or three minutes 
when I heard another shell coming. I ducked 
my head, sticking my nose into the mud. And 
then she smashed. I don't know whether it hit 
in front or behind; how near it was, or how big. 
All I knew was that there was another crash, 
which somehow seemed to come from below, and 
I oozed up, up, up out of the ground. l Oozed' 
is the only way I can express it. I could feel my- 
self trickling up through the mud, and then sud- 
denly I fetched loose and flew. I must have gone 
up ten feet, and I came down all spraddled out, 
but on my feet. I promptly sat down. I sat for 
not more than a few seconds and then deliber- 
ately got up. I didn't have a scratch. It was 
a case of in again, out again. I had been buried 
under by a shell, which should, by all rules of the 
game, have done me in, and had been boosted 
out again by another that should have pulverized 
me. And no harm was done." 



HOW A MOTOR CAR TRAPPED 
A ZEPPELIN 

A N ENGLISH non-commissioned officer, 
/ \ designated as "Corporal Victor" was 
-*• * engaged in scouring the French country- 
side in a "big six" motor car. In the course of 
his highway peregrinations he had observed 
strange automobiles carrying queerly twisted 
rear lamps, whose appearances were always fol- 
lowed by a Zeppelin raid in the neighborhood. 
He also discovered that certain houses before which 
these automobiles stopped had chimneys which 
emitted peculiar sparks, as though on fire, shortly 
afterward. The corporal pondered over the mys- 
tery. He decided that the automobiles and 
chimneys served as land guides and signallers to 
the aerial marauders. A night came when he 
and his mechanician chanced to come across such 
an automobile and such a house. It was a quiet 
country-house and their car stopped at the side of 
the road before it. Here the story, as told in the 

173 



i 7 4 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

Philadelphia Public Ledger, may be continued in 
his own words: 

"A big pine tree almost brushed the window of 
the dining room, which was slightly open at the 
top. Climbing into its branches, I was sufficiently 
near to hear the low conversation, though I was 
unable to see the speakers. I could distinguish 
at least three voices, and they spoke in German 
(the corporal knew German). 

" I learned that another air raid had been made 
on London that very night (the period was early 
in 1 916) and one of the Zeppelins having been 
damaged was returning that way direct to Ger- 
many instead of to its base at Zeebrugge. It was 
to be very carefully piloted, as owing to its state 
it was flying very low, and should arrive over 
their neighborhood about one o'clock. It was 
then well past midnight, as far as I could calculate. 

"How all this information had so quickly come 
into their possession I did not then know, though 
I learned later on. I heard further details, too, 
which explained the use of the car (the corporal 
referred to the machine he saw that night) and the 
upturned headlight. 



TRAPPED A ZEPPELIN 175 

"For quite half an hour I waited, listening to 
the clatter of knives and forks; to the popping of 
corks and whole-hearted ' strafing ' of England, 
which I longed to interrupt; but I had something 
better on hand. 

"At length I heard someone moving about, 
and it seemed to me as if the chimney went on 
fire. Then they made to come out. In an instant 
I was down on the soft earth and out by the gate. 
A glance at the chimney showed it was still emit- 
ting clouds of sparks. 

"We heard their footsteps on the gravel as we 
slid quickly away into the shades of the moonless 
night. Then we let her rip for a mile, and she 
could hop it, too ! 

"'See their chimney on fire?' I queried. 

" 'Fire ! ' said Max, with withering scorn. " Mag- 
nesium and electric light went up that chimney, 
or I'm no photographer!' — which the little Scot 
was before he went to war. 

"We knew every inch of the road for ten miles 
around and every mile to the north and the brown 
trenches there. By taking a cross road and doub- 
ling back we got almost opposite the house in the 



1 76 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

wood, though rather over half a kilometer to the 
east of it. 

"'Listen!' 

"'Yes, that's it for sure! Now turn on the 
lights/ for we had been travelling without their 
aid. . . . 

"The great shape loomed out of the darkness 
and seemed to touch the tops of the trees that 
lined the road, as it gently swayed on the still 
night air. 

"We flicked our lights off and on once or twice, 
then moved away. For a moment or two nothing 
happened in the air. . . . But again we heard 
the engines above rattle into life, and that they 
were following our light seemed assured. At the 
first crossroads I turned sharply to the right, and 
the great airship gliding over us did likewise; then 
at last I felt a grim satisfaction, and proceeded 
with the plan I had worked out most carefully 
during the week, but had kept to myself. 

" 'Where to ? ' queried Max. 

"'The big Noberg foundry!' 

"'My God, what an idea!' 

"Picture to yourself a great straggling works, 




Courtesy, Red Cross Magazine 

FIRST AID IN THE TRENCHES UNDER FIRE , 

Figures prove that the Medical Corps suffer the greatest losses of all 
branches of the service. The M. C. man sacrifices himself for the sake 
of his wounded comrades without a chance to defend himself 



TRAPPED A ZEPPELIN 177 

spread over many acres, with a dozen tall chimneys 
scattered over the space; one of them almost, if 
not quite, the loftiest stack in all France. 

"I tried to gauge the top speed of which the 
Count's ship was capable and found it could do 
barely forty miles an hour, and the faster it went 
the lower down it came. According to our in- 
formation it should have been able to fly at nearly 
eighty miles when in proper trim, so it was clear 
our gunners had hit it. 

"Once or twice they tried to work a searchlight, 
but it only gave a momentary flash, then blinked 
feebly and went out. Everything seemed to be 
going as I could wish, and only another mile lay 
between us and the foundry. 

"So unexpectedly as to make me start there was 
the sound of something heavy falling to earth; 
they were evidently throwing things out to lighten 
the load. Up it went, higher than ever we had 
seen it go. At this sight my "heart sank. Still, 
it was now or never. 

" Its rise had put- it behind us, and I slowed to 
let it come up again; then I accelerated and joy- 
fully heard the strain of the big engines in their 



178 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

effort to keep with us, and it pulled them down 
once more. 

" We were on the last quarter mile and the road 
ended at the foundry! The car was bumping and 
swaying on the cart-broken road like a ship on a 
stormy sea. My wrists ached and throbbed, 
almost paralyzed by the vibration. 

"The dark iron gateway that barred our track 
seemed rushing toward us. Max clutched my 
arm, terrified lest I was going to drive to certain 
death against the gates; but with a stamp of my 
foot on the lighting switchboard, I pressed in 
the whole row of plugs, and we seemed to pitch 
into the very depths of blackness. All my brakes 
went on, and the wheels locked, while the scream 
of the tires sounded like a wail from hell. 

"There was the sound of falling bricks. The 
Zeppelin car had struck the first chimney. There 
was a vicious spurt of machine-gun fire by some- 
one who understood too late, and we both found 
ourselves under the overturned motor car in the 
ditch where my sudden stoppage had thrown us. 

"Then the whole earth seemed to tremble as the 
giant smokestack toppled over to ruin. There 



TRAPPED A ZEPPELIN 179 

were other sounds, too, which no mortal could 
describe. But from that raid on London town at 
least one Zeppelin never returned to Germany." 

The corporaFs stratagem is readily discerned. 
The car he had tracked earlier in the evening was 
a Zeppelin guide. When he heard the air machine 
over the house he adapted his car to serve as a 
substitute for the absent guide in order to lead 
the Zeppelin astray. Turning the rear-lights 
skyward, as the guide's were turned, he decoyed 
the aerial wanderer to follow his car — direct to 
the foundry chimney, where it came to grief. 

When he and his mechanician returned to the 
house later, they found it deserted. In its cellar 
was a powerful wireless plant; among the trees, 
cunningly concealed, were the wires of the installa- 
tion. Instead of a fireplace in the dining room 
was a powerful electric light projector, which 
worked up the chimney. The magnesium was 
there, too. 



RUSHING THE WOUNDED THROUGH 
GAS- AND SHELL-FIRE 

AN AMBULANCE driver, Charles G. 

Zjk Muller, thus recounts in the New York 
-*■ ** Herald the ordeals faced by heroic men 
whose duty called them to take the wounded from 
the field of battle : 

"In spite of Fritzie's many attempts to kill 
off the American boys who made their way over 
bombarded roads only two of our section were 
seriously injured. MacQuillen and Vetterlein 
both came from Philadelphia, and both stuck 
together from the time they left the States. Mac 
and Vet were on the same car and drove together 
on all the runs. 

"One night a call came in from No. 272, and 

una 

these boys were sent up there. The post was being 
bombarded heavily when they got there, but, as 
the wounded men were in a very weak state, the 

boys decided to run through the shell fire in order 

180 



RUSHING WOUNDED THROUGH GAS 181 

to get the blesses to the hospital as soon as 
possible. 

"While the car was being loaded a big shell 
exploded beside it and knocked every one flat. 
Mac was blown clean inside the doorway of 
the dugout. The captain on the stretcher was 
killed, and so was the brancardier whom Vet was 
helping to lift the stretcher into place, Vet was 
knocked silly and got filled with shrapnel. 

"A hurry call was sent back to the main poste 
de secours dressing station, and Bean and Morehead 
started out for No. 272, followed closely by Clark 
and Cadwell in a second ambulance. They had 
to go through heavy traffic and through a heavy 
fire that Fritzie was sending over on the roads. 
Once clear of the traffic they ran into gas that was 
being sent over in shells that threw off the poison- 
ous fumes when they exploded. Bean and More- 
head played it safe and put their gas masks over 
their heads before driving through the gas, but 
Clark and Cadwell figured that the area of danger 
must be limited and took a long chance on getting 
through without stopping to put on the masks. 
By good fortune they passed through the poisonous 



182 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

zone and arrived safely at No. 272. All the 
wounded were brought down, rushed through the 
gas and the shell fire on the roads, and taken to 
the nearest hospital. 

"Mac had to lose his leg and two of his fingers 
and Vet underwent an operation that removed 
eight pieces of shrapnel from his body. Both of 
the boys were awarded the Croix de Guerre, and 
soon after receiving this medal were honored with 
the Medaille Militaire, the decoration that is given 
only to men who have escaped death by the nar- 
rowest margin." 



ALONE ON A RAFT 

FOURTEEN survivors from the torpedoed 
Amiral Chamy clung to a raft in the 
Mediterranean. Finally there was only 
one, Joseph Cariou. He tells a story of terrible 
days and nights: 

"On the eighth day of February, 1916, in the 
morning, we lay off Beirut eleven miles out. I 
was on the after deck. The weather was fair; 
it was not very cold, and there was little wind. 
As I stood there, looking off, I thought of the sub- 
marine we had seen in the region of the island of 
Rouad the night before. 

"Then I heard a heavy noise and someone 
cried: "That was a torpedo!' 

"I wanted to get a warmer blouse, but there 
was no time; in an instant I was thrown forward. 
Then the ship went down. 

"When I came to the surface I was close to a 
broken hencoop and a raft was coming toward me. 
. 183 



i84 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

There were six or seven men on it. After they 
had dragged me up and settled me on the raft 
some of them went into the water to get planks. 
They expected a heavy load. They wanted to 
strengthen the raft. 

"By nine o'clock in the morning there were four- 
teen of us and we had nothing to eat or drink. 
The weather this first day was fair; the sea was 
calm, but most of the time we were ankle deep in 
the wash because the raft was overladen. 

"Toward ten o'clock that night a quarter- 
master lost his head. He ordered us to land and 
get him a drink of water. When he saw that we 
were not going to obey him, he made violent mo- 
tions and most of us went overboard. We kept 
our heads above water, and, in the morning, some 
of us succeeded in getting back onto the raft. 

"The second day there was a storm and the 
wind carried us farther from the land. The 
clouds were dark; we could not see the coast. 
It was bad, but not so bad as the night before, 
when we had been forced to stand in the sea tread- 
ing water, clinging to the raft with one hand while 
we fastened on the planks. All that night I had 



ALONE ON A RAFT 185 

been sick as a dog from swallowing sea water. 
That second day there were not so many of us. 
Some of the men who went into the water as the 
result of the effervescence of the crazy man did 
not come back. All told, there were now only 
six on the raft. 

"The third day, when night was coming on, 
three men jumped off. I saw them do it; they 
went in the same way, one after the other. One 
of them went because he wanted some tobacco. 
There were now three of us left — the quarter- 
master, who had agonizing stomach pains; a 
young sailor, a boy too far gone to speak; and 
myself. The quartermaster was still lightheaded; 
whenever he turned his eyes to the horizon he 
thought he saw torpedoes. He was hungry. He 
wanted to land so that he could go to a restaurant 
and get something. There was no way to quiet 
him. He tried to get me to put him ashore. 
Toward sunset he jumped into the sea. 

"Only the boy and I now remained. About 
midnight, as near as I could make out, the boy 
went. I did not notice how he did it, or what led 
up to it. 



186 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

"I was alone! Two days and nights went by. 
I was in torment. Worst of all, I was freezing, 
and, at the same time, I was on fire from thirst. 
My teeth were blazing hot. By that time my 
head was splitting and I was getting the heavy 
swells of some storm in mid-ocean. The raft rose 
on a long roller, then she sank as if falling. I 
watched for my chance. When she went down 
in the trough I clung to her with one hand, 
hollowed the other hand, scooped water, and rinsed 
my mouth. I was better for a few minutes; 
then I was as bad as ever. 

"I cut the end of my little finger with my pocket 
knife. I sucked the blood, but I could not swallow 
it. I thought the blood of my arm might go 
down, so I tried to open a vein, but I was too weak. 
I cut myself but I did not draw blood. My 
hand shook too much. 

" On the seventh day I saw a ship. I signalled, 
but just then the raft went down between two 
hills of roaring green, and when I came up the 
ship was gone. I watched for her. 

"At night the wind fell; it was dead cold. It 
was the cold that hurt me most. I said: 'The 



ALONE ON A RAFT 187 

water is warmer than the air. I will take a dip; 
that will warm me.' I clung to the raft and went 
in. It warmed me a little; but I thought of the 
cramps and was afraid. I was clinging by my 
left hand. When the swell raised me I swung 
aboard. I crawled away from the edge and by 
and by I was in the middle. I was glad to feel 
planks under me once more. I was drowsy and 
I said to myself : ' Now I can rest ! ' 

"That day the sea was calm. But I was sick of 
it! They all went overboard, thought I — maybe 
now is my time! I thought of the folks at home 
. . . waiting for me. I braced up and after a 
while I went to sleep. 

"I have no means of knowing how long I slept. 
When I awoke my courage had come back. 

"About seven o'clock of what I guessed was Sun- 
day morning I saw a ship. I stood the oar up with 
my signal waving. I may have held it up five 
minutes ... I was weak; I had to let it 
faU. 

"But they had seen it! At first they took it for 
a periscope. When they saw that it was not a 
periscope, they signaled to me — and then I saw 



188 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

them rising and falling with the sea • . . 
coming for me! 

"They poured hot milk and rum down my throat 
and put me to bed; but four days and four nights 
passed before I could sleep. 

"On the Charny a man was with me who had 
escaped from the Leon Gambetta. We spoke of 
destiny; he had escaped death. 

"That first day when we were crowded together 
on the raft I saw that same man. He was in 
the sea some distance away from us. It was his , 
destiny to die." 



HOW ROCKWELL DIED 

A GROUP of American aviators affiliated 
with the French Flying Corps were ordered 
in the fall of 191 5 to Luxeuil in the Vosges 
to take*part in a raid on the famous Mauser works 
at Oberndorf.. Besides Captain Thenault and 
Lieutenant de Laage de Mieux — the French 
officers — the following American pilots were in 
the escadrille: Lieutenant Thaw, who had re- 
turned to the front after being wounded in the 
arm; Adjutants Norman Prince, Hall, Lufbery, 
and Masson; and Sergeants Kiffin Rockwell, 
Hill, Pavelka, Johnson, Rumsey, and James R. 
McConnell. The last-named is the chronicler 
of their exploits in "Flying for France." 

A large British aviation contingent, composed 
of more than fifty pilots and a thousand men of 
the Royal Navy Flying Corps, were already at 
Luxeuil when the escadrille arrived. They were 
there to cooperate with the French-American 

flyers in the Mauser raid. 

189 



i9o SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

Rockwell and Lufbery mounted on September 
23d on the first flight of the escadrille at Luxeuil. 
They became separated in the air, but each flew 
on alone, a dangerous course to take, Mr. 
McConnell said, in the Alsace sector. There was 
little fighting in the trenches there, but great air 
activity. Due to the British and French squad- 
rons at Luxeuil, and the threat their presence 
implied, the Germans had gathered a large fleet of 
fighting machines to oppose them. 

Just before Rockwell reached the lines he 
spied a German machine under him flying at 
11,000 feet within Allied territory. He had shot 
down many German machines — more than the 
rest of the American escadrille put together — but 
they had fallen in their own lines, and this was the 
first opportunity he had had of bringing one down 
on the French side. 

A captain, the commandant of an Alsatian 
village, watched the aerial battle through his 
field glasses. He said that Rockwell approached 
so close to his enemy that he thought there would 
be a collision. The German craft, which carried 
two machine guns, had opened a rapid fire when 



HOW ROCKWELL DIED 191 

Rockwell started his drive. He plunged through 
the stream of lead, and only when very close to 
his opponent did he begin shooting. For a second 
it looked as if the German were falling, so the 
captain said, but then he saw the French machine 
turn rapidly nose down, and the wings of one side 
break off and flutter in the wake of the airplane, 
which hurtled earthward in a rapid drop. It crashed 
into the ground in a small field — a field of flowers — 
a few hundred yards back of the trenches. 

The Germans immediately opened up on the 
wreck with artillery fire. In spite of the bursting 
shrapnel, gunners from a near-by battery rushed 
out and rescued poor Rockwell's broken body. 
There was a hideous wound in his breast where an 
explosive bullet had torn through. A surgeon 
who examined the body testified that if it had 
been an ordinary bullet Rockwell would have had 
an even chance of landing with only a bad wound. 
As it was he was killed the instant the unlawful 
missile exploded. 

"No greater blow could have befallen the esca- 
drille," said Mr. McConnell. "Kimn was its 
soul. He was loved and looked up to by not only 



192 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

every man in our flying corps but by everyone 
who knew him. Kimn was imbued with the spirit 
of the cause for which he fought and gave his heart 
and soul to the performance of his duty. He said: 
'I pay my part for Lafayette and Rochambeau,' 
and he gave the fullest measure. . . . When 
he was over the lines the Germans did not pass — 
and he was over them most of the time." 

OUT FOR VENGEANCE 

Lufbery meantime had engaged a German 
craft; but before he could get to close range two 
Fokkers swooped down from behind and filled 
his airplane full of holes. Exhausting his ammu- 
nition, he landed at Fontaine, an aviation field 
near the lines. There he learned of Rockwell's 
death and was told that two other French machines 
had been brought down within the hour. He 
ordered his gasoline tank filled, procured a full band 
of cartridges, and soared up in the air to avenge 
his comrade. He sped up and down the lines 
and made a wide detour to Habsheim, where 
the Germans had an aviation field, but all to no 
avail. Not a Boche was in the air. 



HOW ROCKWELL DIED 193 

Rockwell's death urged the rest of the men to 
greater action, and several were constantly after 
the Boches. Prince brought one down. Lufbery, 
the most skillful and successful fighter in the 
escadrille, would venture far into the enemy's 
lines and spiral down over a German aviation 
camp, daring the pilots to venture forth. One 
day he stirred them up, but as he was short of 
fuel he had to make for home before they took 
to the air. 

Prince was also out in search of a combat. He 
got it. He ran into the crowd Lufbery had 
aroused. Bullets cut into his machine, and one, 
exploding on the front edge of a lower wing, broke 
it. Another shattered a supporting mast. It 
was a miracle, Mr. McConnell remarked, that 
the machine did not give way. Badly battered 
as it was, Prince succeeded in bringing it back 
from over Miilhausen, where the fight occurred, to 
his field at Luxeuil. 

luebery's narrow escape 

The same day that Prince was so nearly brought 
down Lufbery missed death by a very narrow 



i 9 4 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

margin. He had taken on more gasoline and 
made another sortie. When over the lines again 
he encountered a German with whom he had a 
fighting acquaintance. That is, he and the 
Boche, who was an excellent pilot, had tried to 
kill each other on one or two occasions before. 
Each was too good for the other. Lufbery 
manoeuvred for position but, before he could 
shoot, the Teuton would evade him by a clever 
turn. They kept after each other, the Boche 
retreating into his lines. 

When they were nearing Habsheim, Lufbery 
glanced back and saw French shrapnel bursting 
over the trenches. It meant that a German plane 
was over French territory, and it was his duty 
to drive it off. Swooping down near his adversary 
he waved good-bye, the enemy pilot did likewise, 
and Lufbery whirred off to chase the other repre- 
sentative of Kultur. He caught up with him and 
dived to the attack, but he was surprised by a 
German he had not hitherto seen. 

Before he could escape three bullets entered his 
motor; two passed through the fur-lined combina- 
tion he wore, another ripped open one of his 



HOW ROCKWELL DIED 195 

woolen flying boots. His airplane was riddled 
from wing tip to wing tip, and other bullets cut 
the elevating plane. Had he not been an excep- 
tional aviator he never would have brought safely 
to earth so badly damaged a machine. It was so 
thoroughly shot up that it was junked as being 
beyond repair. Fortunately Lufbery was over 
French territory, or his forced descent would have 
resulted in his being made prisoner. 

THE RAID AT OBERNDORF 

« 

On October 12 th, twenty small airplanes, flying 
in a V formation, at such a height that they re- 
sembled a flock of geese, left Luxeuil and crossed 
the Rhine where it skirts the plains of Alsace, 
then, turning north, headed for the famous 
Mauser works at Oberndorf. Following in their 
wake was an equal number of larger machines, 
and above these darted and circled swift fighting 
craft. The first group of aircraft was flown 
by British pilots, the second by French, and 
three of the fighting planes by Americans in 
the French aviation division, namely, Lufbery, 
Norman Prince, and Masson. It was a cos- 



r 9 6 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

mopolitan collection that effected that successful 
raid. 

The English, in their single-seated Sopwiths, 
carried four bombs each; the big French Brequets 
and the Farmans soared aloft with tons of explo- 
sives destined for the Mauser works. 

The Germans were taken completely by surprise 
and, as a result, few of their machines were in 
the air. The bombardment fleet was attacked, 
however, and six of its planes shot down, some 
of them falling in flames. Baron, the famous 
French night bombardier, lost his life in one of 
the Farmans. Two Germans were brought down 
by machines they had attacked, and the four 
pilots from the American escadrille accounted 
for one each. Lieutenant de Laage, the French 
officer who led the Americans, shot down his 
Boche as he was attacking another French machine 
and Masson did likewise. Explaining it, after- 
ward, he said: "All of a sudden I saw a Boche 
come between me and a Brequet I was following. 
I just began to shoot, and darned if he didn't 
fall." 

The Sopwiths arrived first at Oberndorf . Drop- 



HOW ROCKWELL DIED 197 

ping low over the Mauser works they discharged 
their bombs and headed homeward. All arrived 
save one, whose pilot lost his way and came to 
earth in Switzerland. When the big machines 
got to Oberndorf they saw only flames and 
smoke where once the rifle factory stood. They 
unloaded their explosives on the burning 
mass. 

The Nieuport machines of the Americans went 
up to clear the air of Germans who might be hover- 
ing in wait for the return of the bombardment 
planes which had continued on into Germany. 
Prince found one German plane and promptly shot 
it down. Lufbery came upon three. He drove 
for one, making it drop below the others; then, 
forcing a second to descend, attacked the one re- 
maining above. The combat was short and at 
the end of it the German tumbled to earth. 
This made the fifth enemy machine which was 
officially credited to Lufbery. 

When a pilot accounts for five Bodies he is 
mentioned by name in the official communication 
and is spoken of as an "As" ("Ace,") which is 
French aerial slang for a "super-pilot." 



i 9 8 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

prince's fatal fall 

Darkness was coming rapidly on, but Prince 
and Lufbery remained in the air to protect the 
bombardment fleet. Just at nightfall Lufbery 
made for a small aviation field near the lines, 
known as Corcieux. 

Slow-moving machines, with great planing 
capacity, Mr. McConnell pointed out, can be 
landed in the dark, but to try and feel for the 
ground in a Nieuport, which comes down at about 
a hundred miles an hour, is to court disaster. 

Ten minutes after Lufbery landed, Prince de- 
cided to make for the field. He spiraled down 
through the night air and skimmed rapidly over 
the trees bordering the Corcieux field. In the 
dark he did not see a high-tension electric cable 
that was stretched just above the tree-tops. The 
landing gear of his airplane struck it. The ma- 
chine snapped forward and hit the ground on its 
nose. It turned over and over. The belt holding 
Prince broke and he was thrown far from the 
wrecked plane. Both his legs were broken and 
he was internally injured. Before his death he 



HOW ROCKWELL DIED 199 

was named a second lieutenant and decorated 
with the Legion of Honor. Like Rockwell, 
he held the Medaille Militaire and the Croix de 
Guerre. 

Two days after Prince's death the escadrille 
received orders to leave for the Somme. The 
night before their departure the British gave the 
American pilots a banquet and toasted them as 
"Our Guardian Angels." 



LAY IN WAIT FOR THE CONVOY 

4N AMERICAN destroyer flotilla convoyed 

/% a fleet of merchantmen across the sub- 
-*- *• marine zone and duly encountered one of 
the foe. Herman Whitaker, an observer on one 
of the destroyers, thus describes in the New York 
Sunday Sun what happened: 

"Fritz was there. There? Why for two days 
he had been there lying in wait for the convoy 
which was now poking cautiously out through 
the heads, and when he attacked it was like the 
leap of a lone wolf on a flock with the following 
rush of shepherd dogs at his throat. As he rose 
to take his sight at the leading steamer a destroyer 
almost ran him down. Indeed it was going full 
speed astern to avoid the collision when his 
periscope showed above water. 

"It was only an instant and the periscope was of 
the finger variety, an inch and a half in diameter. 
It was raised in that instant scarcely a foot above 



LAY IN WAIT FOR THE CONVOY 201 

the water, but was still picked up by the sharp, 
young eyes of the lookout on the next destroyer. 
The submarine had submerged at once, but mshing 
along his wake the destroyer dropped a depth 
mine that wrecked the motors, damaged the oil 
leads, blew off the rudder, tipped the stern up, 
and sent the 'sub' down on a headlong dive fully 
two hundred feet. 

"Afterward the commander said that he thought 
she would never stop. In a desperate effort to 
check her before she was crushed by deep sea pres- 
sure he blew out all his four water-ballast tanks 
and so came shooting back up with such velocity 
that the 'sub' leaped thirty feet out of the water 
like a beaching whale. 

"Instantly the first destroyer, which had swung 
on a swift circle, charged and dropped a second 
depth mine as the submarine went down again. 
As the first cleared out of the way the second 
destroyer opened with her bow guns on the 
conning tower, which was now showing again. 

"Having no rudder the 'sub' was ' porpoising ' 
along, now up, now down, and every time the 
conning tower showed the destroyers sent a 



202 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

shot whistling past it. They had fired three each 
before the hatch flew up and the crew came stream- 
ing out and ranged along the deck with their 
hands held up. 

"As the destroyers hove alongside, covering the 
crew with their guns, two were seen to run back 
below. They were only gone a minute. But 
that was sufficient. Undoubtedly they had opened 
the sea cocks and scuttled the vessel, for she sank 
three minutes thereafter. 

"The crew jumped into the water and were 
hauled aboard the destroyer as fast as they could 
catch a line, all but one poor chap who could not 
swim and was nearly drowned before he was seen. 
Then, in vivid contrast to the German practice 
under similar circumstances, two of our men 
leaped overboard and held him up till he could 
be hauled aboard. It was, however, too late. 
He died while efforts were being made to resusci- 
tate him. „ 

"All had happened in no more than ten minutes 
from the dropping of the first depth charge." 



THE BATTLE IN THE WOOD 

SOMEWHERE in the north of France there 
I is a little wood. According to Edgar C. 
Middleton in his book "The Man of the Air" 
(published by Frederick Stokes & Co.), it is about 
half a square mile in area, and stands immediately 
south of a fine, broad high-road, along which there 
daily pass large bodies of reinforcements — infantry 
and cavalry — and convoys bringing up ammuni- 
tion and supplies. The tall trees offer a welcome 
shade in the hot weather, and it was the custom 
of passing troops to halt there for a short time; 
and just at this spot the roadside was always 
littered with broken bottles. It is needless to state 
that it was in German territory. 

However, had it not been for that road, and 
for the fact that on this certain day, when the 
road had been closed to all traffic, there were 

certain mysterious movements of ponderous great 

203 



2o 4 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

wagons — suspiciously like ammunition wagons — 
which halted in the shade of the wood, this story 
would never have been written. 

The day was hot and the work was heavy, and 
Mein Herr Captain paused for a moment to curse 
his uncongenial task, and take a long draught 
from his bottle, of some liquor that certainly was 
not water. While he was drinking he let it fall 
with a curse of rage and amazement, for there, 
overhead, as if it had suddenly appeared from the 
clouds, was the form of a British airplane. " Eim- 
mel /"he exclaimed, "all our trouble wasted, they 
have our hiding spot discovered, and to-morrow 
morning they bomb us — ach /" 

The worthy gentleman was not far out in his 
deduction, for the lynx eye of the observer in the 
airplane had carefully noted the exact geographical 
position of that new ammunition park before the 
machine sped off homeward, but he was wrong 
— to a certain extent. Our aviators are no 
fools, and they realized that Mr. Boche would 
soon expect a return visit and would be carefully 
prepared therefor. It was essential that that am- 
munition park be destroyed, but in a manner and 



THE BATTLE IN THE WOOD 205 

at a time the Germans least expected. And this 
was how it was accomplished. 

Toward evening a light scouting machine sped 
swiftly away from a certain British airdrome, 
only a few miles behind the firing lines. No 
unusual incident that, but it was particularly con- 
spicuous from the fact that the entire airdrome 
had turned out to wish the trip God-speed; to 
wish the pilot — a young second lieutenant of the 
Canadian Infantry — the best of luck, and to cram 
the fuselage of the machine with spare ammunition 
until she could barely "stagger" off the ground. 
The objective was the ammunition park already 
mentioned. 

With long,sweeping circles the scout soon cleared 
the area of the fighting lines and arrived over the 
wood. Nothing happened. The whole country- 
side was remarkably quiet for a battle area. No 
anti-aircraft guns fired; no enemy planes came 
humming round. Lower came the pilot, to in- 
vestigate. 

Still nothing happened. He, on his part, now 
began to feel genuinely alarmed, and yet, of 
course that confounded observer may have been 



2o6 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 



"seeing" things — a not unknown failing with 
airplane observers. 

Meantime, in the midst of the wood, the corpu- 
lent captain watched the small speck carefully 
with his glasses, then rubbed his fat hands with 
glee and expectation. The fool Englishman was 
falling beautifully into his little trap. Involun- 
tarily he glanced over his. shoulder, and there, in a 
large clearing behind the wood, were ten great 
German battle planes, all ready to go up at a 
moment's notice, and with pilots and observers 
standing by. 

By this time the British machine had come 
considerably lower and was well behind the 
wood and into the German country. The captain 
gave a sharp, guttural order. Immediately the 
noise of ten great propellers smote the still air, 
and the squadron rose swiftly from the wood like 
a covey of wild ducks. The hated Englishman 
was hopelessly trapped. 

And what of our man? Turning leisurely to 
make a last reconnaissance of the wood, he found 
ten great German battle planes between himself 
and his lines. He cursed profusely at his own 



THE BATTLE IN THE WOOD 207 

crass stupidity. He had been warned, and he had 
thought fit to ignore the warning; this was the 
result Anyway, he would make a good fight 
for it. 

He fingered his machine gun cautiously. Yes, 
everything was ready at hand. He set his teeth, 
opened his engine "full out" and began to climb 
rapidly. 

The Germans also climbed, and within a very 
short space of time he found himself hemmed 
in on all sides, with lead flying at him from all 
points and at all angles. Anyhow, he determined 
to have a good run for his life, so, singling out two 
Germans immediately beneath him, he dived 
rapidly. As he did so he was hit by shrapnel and, 
for a short space of time, he was unconscious. 
Then again regaining control of his machine, 
he began to use his machine gun to good effect. 

First one German was driven to the ground, 
then another, then a third. His blood was up 
now, and he turned round for further victims, 
but the Huns had had sufficient for one day, and 
were scuttling off to peace and safety. He turned 
homeward, just as his wound was becoming ag- 



208 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

onizing, as a bombing squadron of our own ma- 
chines passed by. 

Very soon there rose from the wood violent 
explosions and blinding sheets of flame, and by 
that time the British bombing squadron had 
finished its full design. All that remained of 
the fat captain's ammunition park were a few 
broken and shattered wagons, and a heap of dead 
or dying men. 



HEAD-ON COLLISION UNDER WATER 

MR. WHITAKER heard tales of Homeric 
encounters between English and Ger- 
man "subs." Fancy a head-on •collision 
under water! Well, it occurred. Two came to- 
gether one evening at dusk, backed off, fired a tor- 
pedo apiece, then lost each other in the darkness. 



209 



BEER, BLOOD, BOCHES, AND BOTTLES 

ANOTHER English "sub" popped out of 
/\ the water one day alongside a steamer 
-*■ ^ that was being sunk by a Fritzer's shell- 
fire. The steamer lay between him and the 
Fritzer, so, diving, the Englishman waited till 
Fritz came sailing around, then put a torpedo into 
his hull. For some reason — perhaps it was loot 
from the steamer — Fritz had some cases of beer 
piled on his deck. His end is crudely but vividly 
described, Mr. Whitaker says, in the report of the 
English commander: 

"When he went up, the air was full of beer, 
blood, Boches, and broken bottles." 



A TIGHT CORNER 

THE other day a most exciting adventure 
befell me," Mr. Middleton writes. "I was 
detailed to take part in a bombing raid 

at . We had not proceeded far beyond our own 

lines, after the customary bombardment of anti- 
aircraft shells, when suddenly the machine immedi- 
ately in front of us rocked violently and began to 
dive toward the earth. 

"'B 's been hit!' my observer bawled in my 

ear. 

"I continued to watch the machine in its head- 
long descent. Alas, it was only too true ! There was 
no possible escape; after-diving steeply six hundred 
feet the machine had begun to spin and was now 
whirling round and round like a humming top, 
and, hardly a minute after, had crashed into the 
midst of a wood, from which there immediately 
came a cloud of gray smoke and a leaping tongue 
of flame. 

211 



212 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

"We had started out four strong; our mission 

being to raid M , a large German military 

centre, containing a staff headquarters, an ammu- 
nition park, and a large airdrome. And now our 
machine was the sole survivor, two having been 
shot down while crossing the lines. Alone and 
single-handed, in a notoriously dangerous portion 
of the enemy's lines, every moment we were liable 
to be tired at from all quarters and attacked by 
enemy aircraft. 

"I looked searchingly at my observer; it was his 
first trip across the lines, and I had to admit to 
myself that never before in my six months of 
flying at the front had I been in such an uncom- 
fortable position. How would he take it? I 
hesitated. Should we turn back to safety, or 
should we continue on our way to what was 
almost certain death? I glanced at his face ; it was 
stern and set, with the deliberation of the man 
who is willing to risk everything. With his left 
hand he patted and fondled the deadly machine 
gun. I determined to go on. 

"They opened fire on us again. Apparently 
for the last few minutes they had all deserted their 



A TIGHT CORNER 213 

guns and had been busy gaping at the remains 

of poor B 's machine; but now, flushed with 

their recent success, they commenced to fire 
with demoniacal fury. Shots burst behind, before, 
above, below — one minute immediately over the 
nose; the next, immediately beneath the tail 
of the machine. To avoid them we climbed, 
and dived, and banked in all directions, until her 
old ribs began to groan and creak from sheer 
exertion, and she threatened every moment to 
fly asunder in mid-air. 

"At last we got clear of them and sighted our 
objective, just as the sun brqke through the clouds, 
and revealed to us a stretch of low, flat-lying 
country, dotted here arid there wifh villages and 

camps and ammunition bases. M showed 

up easily. It was a moderate-sized town of ant- 
like pigmy dwellings, little white and gray patches 
in the brilliant sunlight. A small winding river 
skirted the town, looking for all the world against 
the dark background like the vein in a man's 
arm. North and south ran the gleaming, glinting 
railway lines, and a large road led up from the town 
to the firing line. This road was now crowded 



2i 4 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

with traffic of all descriptions. We dropped a 
bomb, but it was very wide of the mark, and it 
served to draw the enemy's fire, which again broke 

all round us with renewed fury. M was 

better supplied with anti-aircraft guns than any 
other position on the German front. Higher and 
yet higher we climbed until we were well above the 
clouds, and the earth was almost hidden from our 
sight. By this simple and excellent ruse de guerre 
we might be able to get over the city before the 
gunners were aware of our proximity. 

"But alas for our well-laid plans! We had not 
gone far when we encountered a great double- 
engined Albatross, and there, with the white 
billowy clouds stretching like waves of a gigantic 
sea in all directions, we fought our battle of life 
and death. 

"Fritz opened the encounter by sweeping down 
upon us at top speed, pouring out a steady stream 
from the machine gun in the nose of his plane. 
To avoid this we climbed rapidly, and he flashed 
by beneath us at an alarming rate. We attempted 
to bomb him, but it was futile, and the bomb 
fell to the earth below. 



A TIGHT CORNER 215 

" We turned as soon as we were able, and waited 
for the enemy to recommence the attack. He 
was all out now, and, putting on top speed, bore 
down upon us with the speed of an express train. 
Nearer and still nearer he drew. Thankfully I 
noticed that we were both at the same altitude. 
When yet about a quarter of a mile distant, his 
observer opened fire, the bullets flying past us, 
and still we did not reply. I looked at my ob- 
server. He was bending over his gun, fumbling 
with some portion of the mechanism. There was 
no need to ask what was the matter. Alas! I 
knew too well. The gun had jammed! 

"Now followed a ticklish time for both of us, 
for without the gun we were completely unarmed, 
and Fritz was drawing nearer every second. 
Now he was right level with us. What were 
we to do? To remain in that same posi- 
tion would mean certain death. If we climbed 
he would climb faster, and would almost immedi- 
ately be up with us again. 

"There was only one thing to be done — the un- 
expected! So, putting her nose down, we dived 
toward the earth like a stone and had gone more 



216 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

than a thousand feet before I could get her level 
again. This manoeuvre so upset the calculations of 
the enemy that he was now about three quarters 
of a mile distant. This gave us precious time to 
prepare again for the attack. 

"The observer was still working feverishly away 
when we commenced to climb. Fritz had already 
turned and was coming down to meet us; but we 
had the advantage this time of having the wind 
at our backs. If only that infernal gun were 
ready! Up we climbed and down came Fritz; all 
the faster because he knew we were comparatively 
unarmed. Now we were less than half a mile 
distant; now only a quarter; and now he had 
commenced to fire. Should we never reply? 

"At last! 'Brrr! Brrr! Brrr!' yapped the 
gun in our bow. Fritz was so startled at this un- 
expected development that for a moment he paused 
in his firing. 
"This was our opportunity; taking steady aim 

J fired the whole drum in three bursts. He 

staggered and reeled. I felt I wanted to cry out 
for sheer joy; but my throat was parched and dry. 
Oh, the reaction after that dreadful ten minutes! 



A TIGHT CORNER 217 

But although we had hit him, Fritz was yet by 
no means out of the running, that is, if he elected 
to remain and fight it out, which I doubted ex- 
tremely; for the Hun is ever super-courageous 
when he has an unarmed and helpless foe to deal 
with. So, throttling her down I watched him 
anxiously. 

"Turning to the left he started off at top speed 
in the direction of his own base. This I had ex- 
pected, and off we started on his trail with only 
another half hour's petrol in our tanks. On and 
on he flew, over wood and town, and we were close 
in the rear, both flying at top speed. Every 
moment he was getting lower. I knew only too 
well what that meant. He was trying to lead 
us into a trap, where we should make a set target 
for a ring of his anti-aircraft guns. We must 
never let this happen or we should be finished 
for a certainty. If we could only catch up with 
him; but it was in vain we wished, for he was 
yet a quarter of a mile ahead, when, as usual, 
the unexpected happened. 

"He had engine trouble. Within five minutes 
we were almost on top of him. He commenced 



218 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

to sink like a stone. Now was our opportunity, 
an opportunity which our observer was not slow 
to take advantage of. Right into the middle of 
his back flew the steady stream of bullets. Again 
he reeled, and this time there was that peculiar 
fluttering of the wings which tells only too plainly 
that an airplane is 'out of control.' Like poor 
B he commenced to whirl round like a hum- 
ming top, then with one long last plunge, he had 
crashed into one of his own encampments, and all 
was over. 

4 'We were left to reach our own lines with a 
twenty minutes' supply of petrol remaining and 
under a violent bombardment of the enemy's 
'Archies.' 



COOL AMID FLAMES 

THE most frightful death that can be feared 
in war aviation is perhaps that of burning 
alive in mid flight far above the possibility 
of succor or escape. A shot in the fuel tank or a 
back-fire of an overheated engine may ignite the 
petrol. The unfortunate pilot has but two courses 
open — to descend while his very motion fans the 
flames into redoubled fury, or to jump from his 
machine to certain death without the torture of 
burning. 

The first contingent of American-trained fliers 
to arrive at the front contained a finished pilot 
and a charming gentleman in the person of Ned 
Post, of New York and Harvard. To the thou- 
sands of his friends who witnessed his daring flights 
at Governor's Island and Garden City his exploit 
in France should be of interest. This account ap- 
peared in The Outlook: 

On September 25, 191 7, Lieutenant Post went 

219 



22o SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

aloft in a new type of airplane, the swiftest 

and fastest climbing machine known to aviation. 
He attained a height of twenty-two thousand 
feet in the frigid air before he discovered that he 
was numb with cold. It was the first trial of his 
new machine, and he had left the ground simply 
for the purpose of testing its capacities. 

Volplaning steeply down toward his airdrome, 
Post strained his new craft to the utmost with 
every variety of twist and turn that could pos- 
sibly be experienced in the throes of actual aerial 
combat. Arriving at some two or three thou- 
sand feet above ground, the lieutenant moderated 
his contortions and looked carefully over his wires 
and supports to see that all had withstood the strain 
he had given them. To his horror he discovered 
that his fuel tank was ablaze and that flames were 
spreading rapidly back along the length of the 
tail of his machine. 

With his customary sang-froid, Post cut off his 
motor and eased his blazing airplane down to the 
nearest landing place, unfastening his tools and 
throwing them out as he fell, and detaching as 
many of the instruments from the dashboard as 



COOL AMID FLAMES 221 

could be loosened in such a perilous descent. As 
the airplane rubbed along the ground Post dropped 
the control-stick, climbed out to the forward 
step, and before the roaring flames had time to 
swoop over him, he jumped. 

This cool escape from an apparently certain 
death, together with his forethought in saving 
his tools from destruction, was rewarded by a 
recent citation from his general, praising his 
skill and deportment as an airman, and recom- 
mending his coolness and judgment as an example 
to other aviators training in France. 



SUBMARINE V. SUBMARINE— A THREE- 
MINUTE FIGHT 

THE commander of a British submarine 
thus reported to Whitaker an encounter 
he had with a German U-boat: 

" 10 a.m. — Sighted hostile submarine. Attacked 
same. 

"10:03 A - M - — Torpedoed submarine. Hit with 
one torpedo amidships. Submarine seen to blow 
up and disappear. Surface to look for survivors. 
Put down immediately by destroyers who fired 
at me." 

But this young commander was a little more 
explicit in his footnote, as he might well be, for, 
having kept to sea and his appointed duty under 
circumstances of extreme difficulty and hazard, 
he took his fate in both hands, stalked the enemy, 
and destroyed him. 

"During my attack," he wrote, "there was just 
enough sea to make depth keeping difficult. I 



A THREE-MINUTE FIGHT 223 

fired two torpedoes, and one hit at forward end of 
conning tower. A large column of yellow smoke, 
about one and a half times as high as the mast, 
was observed and the submarine disappeared. 
The explosion was heard and felt in our own sub- 
marine. On the previous day the periscope had 
become very stiff to turn, and in the dark hours I 
attempted to rectify same, but while doing so I 
was forced to dive and thus lost all the tools and 
nuts of the centre bush. 

"While attacking it took two men besides 
myself to turn the periscope. For this reason I 
did not consider it prudent to attack the destroyer 
after having sunk the submarine. 

"After torpedoing submarine I proceeded four 
miles northward and lay on the bottom. Many 
vessels throughout the day were heard in close 
proximity. Several explosions were heard, es- 
pecially one very heavy one. It must have been 
close, as the noise was considerably louder than 
that of the torpedo. On one occasion a wire 
sweep scraped the whole length of the boat along 
my port side, and a vessel was heard to pass di- 
rectly overhead." 



224 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

That is all. The feelings of these gallent men, 
lying on the sea bed, while death in its most horri- 
ble form searched around for them, are left to the 
imagination. They made port safely and, after 
refitting, put off to sea again. 



CAUGHT THE U-BOAT NAPPING 

ANOTHER British submarine sighted a Ger- 
f\ man U-boat and at once gave chase, 
JL JL working blind on the course her com- 
mander laid and trusting somewhat to luck. Mr. 
Whitaker describes the incident in the New York 
Sunday Sun. Now and again her periscope broke 
water for a second or so — only long enough for her 
skipper to confirm his course and bearings. Then 
the British boat navigated into shallow water, so 
shallow indeed that to avoid being seen she had to 
scrape the bottom, bumping uncomfortably and 
dangerously all the while, and had also to dip her 
periscope. 

Luck was with her, and she avoided breaking 
surface until she came to a position favorable for 
attack, between five hundred and six hundred 
yards from the U-boat, which, unsuspecting, was 

lying awash, her conning tower open. Some of 

225 



226 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

her crew were indeed spreading the wind screen 
in preparation for a trip on the surface. 

Little did they dream that in a few seconds 
they would be on their way to "Davy Jones's 
Locker." But so it happened. Away with a hiss 
went the torpedoes from the Britisher's tubes, and as 
they sped on their errand the Britisher was shifted 
so that another tube was brought to bear on the 
enemy. The commander was taking no chances, 
and if the bow tubes missed he was ready to have 
another go. But the bow tubes had been "well 
and truly laid" on the target, and twenty seconds 
after the torpedoes had been fired a dull explosion 
was heard by the British crew. 

But there was no sign of the U-boat. There 
was a great disturbance upon the water where 
the pirate had last been seen, and when the Brit- 
isher reached the spot the sea was found covered 
with a thick layer of oily substance. A wireless 
to the depot port and another red dot went on 
the chart which records the fate of the pirates. 



FACING A GAS ATTACK 

THE following description of a battle be- 
tween the Austrians and Russians, in 
which gas played a leading part, was writ- 
ten by Eugene Szatmari, an Austrian lieutenant 
on the southeastern war front: 

"The night is starlight, not pitch dark, as in the 
dreary month of January, but of a strange, weird, 
dark blue, and the shadows are long, scattered, 
and charming. This lukewarm night is restless. 
Bright flashes from field rockets rip the dark blue 
velvet curtain asunder, and hardly has the glare 
died away — hardly have quiet, invisible cater- 
pillars sewed the curtain together again — when 
the shining finger of a searchlight begins to feel 
its way through the blue night. Rifles crack and 
cannon roar from the east. Since an early hour 
in the morning the guns have been thundering 
toward us from the north and the lazy rattle of 

the distant drum fire penetrates with difficulty 

227 



228 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

through the trees of the shot-torn forest. Now 
they have begun here, too. Heavy shells crash 
through the trees with deafening roars, several 
branches fall slowly, but noisily, rifle bullets come 
whistling along and rattle through the trees. 
My ten telephones hum and sing like mad. But 
my batteries are silent. We do not waste our 
shots in the air. 

"Now a rocket goes up. It goes high, very high, 
and sends down its colored stars in a crackling 
rain of fire. There is another, and still a third — 
and the cannon fire becomes still heavier, the 
shrapnel crashes like mad, and shell after shell 
whizzes toward us in a howling arch, to burst as it 
falls. We know what all this means, the sign that 
has just been made; short and sharp comes the 
message hissed over the telephone: 'A gas 
attack.' 

"On comes the poison wave — we are armed for it. 

"'Gas masks to the front !' In the twinkling 
of an eye we have transformed ourselves into 
masked robbers, and are waiting in curiosity, 
braced for the battle with the unknown weapon, 
against the invisible, creeping, and — up to now, 



FACING A GAS ATTACK 229 

to us unknown — enemy. What is it like, this gas? 
— and we wait the coming wave almost with long- 
ing. Is it really coming after all? 

"It is coming. Something creeps into- my eyes 
and I buckle my mask on again. So it is here, 
then, the sneaking enemy, the poison wave that 
we cannot destroy, the opponent wearing the 
cap of invisibility. Now it sweeps over us, 
overwhelms us; we are in its power, and our 
lives are dependent upon the potash tube that 
gives us air. We stand in the midst of its infected 
atmosphere, and its dragon-like breath toys with 
our clothing. 

"What a frightful yet miserable enemy! The 
guns continue to roar in its neighborhood, and the 
charging enemy's cries of, 'Hurri! hurri!' are 
smothered in the furious rattle of the machine guns. 
They don't need any masks, nor do the cannon that 
are now spewing death in a hundred forms upon the 
enemy from the hidden depths of the forest, 
barking and howling like ever-faithful iron dogs. 
They are armed against the gas, for they need 
no air; and they stretch their bronze bodies out 
in the mad fire as they run back and forth on 



2 3 o SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

their carriages. What a mean weapon — what a 
wretched enemy — is this invisible opponent! 

I feel a strange weight on my chest. The air I 
am breathing is heavy and oppressive; I have to 
swallow at every breath I draw. The mask lies 
on my head like lead, and its big glass peep-holes 
make my eyes ache indescribably. I feel as if I 
stood in a leaden diving suit at the bottom of the 
sea, with the weight of the whole ocean upon me. 
Air! — I must have air — and I loosen the straps of 
my mask, but a terrible shooting pain grips my 
temples, and instinctively I haul them tight again. 
With the telephone in my hand, with the leaden 
weight of the mask on my head, half unconscious, 
I shout orders into the instrument. The great 
glass eyes with which I am now looking bore 
dully into the roaring, rattling, flashing, glaringly 
convulsive night — the night that only an hour 
before was a quiet velvet-blue curtain and that 
now has become a mad monster, spitting poison 
and death. I try to go to the telescope, and I step 
on something soft. I bend down. It is a dead 
mouse. It didn't have any mask. What a fearful 
opponent, this sneaking, invisible enemy! 



FACING A GAS ATTACK 231 

"I can stand it no longer. My temples thump 
like mad and I feel my blood course wildly through 
my veins. I tear apart the straps of the mask — 
and I take a breath of pure, fresh, good air! 
There is a light breeze from the south. It has 
blown away the poisonous waves. The battle 
dies down; the rattle of shots becomes weaker, 
and the cannon are steadily becoming quieter. 
The flashing lights that pierced the night are 
extinguished. It becomes calmer. I breathe, 
breathe deeper, while once more the dark blue vel- 
vet curtain of the night slowly and softly settles 
down over us. 



SUBMARINE CREW SWAM IN OIL 

IN THE dawn of a bright morning a British 
submarine sighted an enemy U-boat running 
on the surface and at once dived to get into 
a favorable position for attack. As the Navy 
would say, she "proceeded as requisite" for fifteen 
minutes and, rising until her periscope was above 
water, picked up her quarry again. The skipper 
wanted to make sure of his game. According to 
Mr. Whitaker: 

Carefully and expertly he manoeuvred his boat 
into a favorable position. Then a quick order 
and out of the tube a shining "tin fish" sped to- 
ward the Hun. In less than a minute the explosion 
was heard, and up to the surface came the Brit- 
isher to look for results. Right ahead the sea 
was covered with a big patch of oil, in which 
three men were swimming. Two were picked up 
by one of the submarine's boats; the other sank 
before he could be reached. Another of the 

Kaiser's pets had "gone west." 

232 



A TOWER THE GERMANS BUILT TOO 
WELL 

4T, BOVENT on the Somme the Germans 
/ \ decided to construct in a small wood or 
-*■ -^ orchard — in its present state of dilapida- 
tion the most expert of gardeners would be puzzled 
to say which of the two it originally was — an 
observation post which was to be capable of 
overlooking a wide expanse of the French lines. 
The position was a good one, and the French would 
undoubtedly have utilized it by contriving some 
ingenious outlook place, which would have been 
completely hidden in the foliage. They would 
have built in all probability something quite 
flimsy, which would be destroyed by the first shell 
that found it and could be as easily set up again. 
Not so the Germans. They set to work to 
build an observation post as if the dismal line of 
trenches on the Somme had been dug for all eter- 
nity. One can conceive the commander of the 

233 



234 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

German battalion, stationed at that point, telling 
his men: "We are now going to dig, and fortify 
with reinforced concrete, sheltersland an observa- 
tion post such as have never been" seen before. 
The war may last for twenty years, but my officers 
and I will be quite safe inside them against the 
heaviest shell ever invented. It is unfortunate 
that most of you will have to be satisfied with 
such protection as you can get from the parapet 
of the trench, but then you will have the immense 
satisfaction of having dug and armored the most 
colossal of all shelters." 

So the German officer built for himself the 
Tower of Bovent. The German sappers worked 
with a zeal that had in it perhaps something of 
the zeal of the builders of the Pyramids, who 
were slaves. They burrowed under the earth like 
moles and built eight roomy shelters thirty feet 
underground, where no shell could penetrate. 
These shelters were connected by subterranean 
passages and provided with a number of exits, 
so that if by an unlucky chance a bursting shell 
should block up any one of them the others should 
still be available. 



A TOWER BUILT TOO WELL 235 

The crowning glory of their work was a tower 
that rose some five or six feet above the ground. 
So long as summer lasted it was hidden by the 
foliage of the trees and undergrowth. No doubt 
when winter came it was to be converted into an 
innocent-looking mound of earth. The tower 
was constructed of great blocks of reinforced 
concrete. It resembled the conning tower of a 
battleship and at the top of it were two narrow 
slits facing the enemy through which the observer 
could watch the French lines or a machine gun 
could fire. The shelters were also protected with 
lumps of concrete that could be regarded as proof 
against any artillery. 

The summer foliage was still hiding the tower 
when one day it occurred to a French artillery 
lieutenant that there was something not quite 
natural about the corner of a wood or orchard 
near Bo vent. It was certainly an ideal place 
for a German look-out, so it occurred to him that 
it might be worth while to send a few salvos of 
"75" shells on the suspicious point. 

His enterprise was rewarded. The "75" shells 
soon made short work of leaves and branches, 



236 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

and there was exposed to view the naked gray 
concrete of the tower. It was then the affair of 
the big guns. The moment for the attack on 
Bovent was drawing near and the gunners were 
asking nothing better than a well-defined target. 
The German officers, who, with their orderlies 
and the telephonists, were safe thirty feet under- 
ground, were in no way disturbed by the discovery 
of their tower. It was proof against any force 
but a direct hit from a very big shell, and their 
shelters below they believed could defy anything. 
So, quite unconcerned, they passed the time as 
usual. They had a piano, and two of them began, 
a game of chess. Then the big French shells 
began to whizz and the life of the men in the 
trench below the tower became anything but 
pleasant. Soon it was difficult to distinguish 
between the original trench, and the shell holes. 
The tower got no direct hit, but its appearance 
became more and more ragged as splinters began 
to tear off its outer coating of concrete. The 
steel that reinforced the concrete appeared in 
hooks and twisted bands and its once-smooth 
surface grew unkempt and scarred. 



A TOWER BUILT TOO WELL 237 

Down below, the Germans worried not at all 
about the appearance of their tower and went on 
with their games. Then, if the scene is rightly 
reconstructed, there came an alarm which really 
affected them. It was announced that the 
French had began to fire gas shells on the position. 
The gas, being heavier than air, is particularly 
deadly in shelters below ground, and the Germans 
were not slow to put on their masks, which, with 
their metal protuberances that suggest a pig's 
snout, are one of the most hideous products of 
a hideous war. 

It was long after that there came a terrific 
explosion. Their shelters seemed to have resisted 
the shock, but the concussion was more than the 
human frame could bear. A very large French 
shell had landed about ten yards to the left of the 
tower, immediately above the shelters. Its ex- 
plosion made a hole in the ground some fifteen 
feet deep, hurled blocks of concrete about as if 
they had been straws, and blocked the entrances 
to the shelters. 

When the French infantry carried the position 
an adventurous soldier managed to squeeze his 



238 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

way down through one of the entrances and saw 
the extraordinary sight of some thirty Boches, 
including two Colonels, lying dead with their gas 
masks on, and apparently not a single wound 
among them. It was impossible to bring the 
bodies up; so the French engineers simply blocked 
up securely the entrances which the shell had 
obstructed, and the tower and shelters, built 
with such an expenditure of labor, merely became 
their builders' tomb. 



THE MERCHANTMAN WON 

rnr^HE triumphs of armed merchantmen over 
German submarines are none too numer- 



Ge 



ous. In the two examples cited here the 
respective captains were more than equal to the 
occasion and proved that, placed on equal terms, 
a merchantman is a match for any submarine. 
Mr. Whitaker reports: 

In the first instance, the captain waited for an 
advantageous moment for a direct hit. When 
first reported by the look-out the U-boat appeared 
through the telescope to be a bark, hull down over 
the horizon, but as the master did not feel quite 
sure he altered course to bring her astern, and soon 
afterward she disappeared. Twenty minutes later 
she was reported again, and this time the master 
was able to identify her as an enemy submarine. 
Slowly she overhauled the steamship, but not 
until an hour and a half later did she fire her 

239 



2 4 o SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

first round. Ten minutes after that her shells were 
pitching all round the merchantman. 

The master now took up station beside the gun 
to spot for his gunner and watch for torpedoes. 
It was an unequal fight, but as the U-boat ap- 
proached it was noticed that she had a list of 
about twenty degrees and that several men were 
at work on her deck beside the foremost gun. 
Then she altered course to port and brought her 
after gun into action. 

This was the real moment for which the captain 
had been waiting. A shot from the steamship's 
gun went over, another fell a bit to the right, her 
third struck the water, exploding close to the 
base of the conning tower. Round No. 4 was a 
direct hit. The shell exploded on the foredeck 
of the submarine beside the gun. 

•A great burst of cheering went up from the 
deck of the merchantman, the gunner threw 
down his firing lanyard, and grasped the hand 
of the mate. And as the shouting died away 
the U-boat turned slowly over on her side and 
slid from view, down and out, after a three hours' 
fight. 



THE MERCHANTMAN WON 241 

GUNFIRE CAUGHT THE FLEEING U-BOAT 

In the second instance a damaged submarine 
vainly attempted to flee from the fire of a merchant- 
man. The steamship had been armed and des- 
patched to defend the trade routes, but one misty 
morning a U-boat challenged her supremacy by 
discharging a torpedo at her. It struck her engine 
room near the water line, making a large rent and 
filling the boiler room, engine room, and No. 5 
hold. Then the submarine appeared about fifty 
yards away, "and so," said the captain, "as my 
guns would bear I opened fire, and our first shot 
hit the base of the conning tower and also removed 
the two periscopes." 

Soon the U-boat assumed a list to port and began 
to draw away slowly. Her stern was nearly 
under water, oil squirted from her side, while her 
crew began to scramble out of the conning tower 
and after hatch. They then held up their hands, 
so the order to cease fire was given, but im- 
mediately afterward the U-boat turned away at 
full speed. 

During this dash for safety the men abaft her 



242 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

conning tower were washed overboard, but mean- 
while the steamship had opened fire again and 
presently an explosion forward ended her career. 

As some of the Germans were to be seen strug- 
gling through the oil that coated the water, 
boats were lowered and two survivors were picked 
up. Of these one quickly inquired whether his 
captain had been saved, but apparently not from 
motives of affection, since he declared he would 
jump overboard if that officer was picked up. 
As the U-boat commander had been previously 
killed by gun-fire, the man consented to remain 
alive as a prisoner. 



HOW THE SNOW TRAPPED A GERMAN 
BATTALION 

A RUSSIAN officer told the following story 
to Montgomery Schuyler: 
" We were creeping across the snow when 
we heard a frightened ' Wer kommt da ? ' 

" 'Hold on Germans! Where the devil do they 
come from?' ask our men in surprise. 'Are they 
numerous? ' 

" ' Wer ist da ? ' we hear again. 
"Our only reply is to fire by the squad, and 
then again. The Germans are a little surprised, 
but pull themselves together and return the fire. 
It is dark and neither side can see the other. In 
groping about we finally meet and it is give and 
take with the bayonet. We strike in silence, but 
bullets are falling about us like rain. Nobody 
knows who is firing and everyone is crying in his 
own language: 'Don't fire! Stop!' From the 
side whence the firing comes, beyond and to the 

243 



244 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

right, they are yelling at us, both in German and 
Russian: ' What's the matter? Where are you?' 

" Our men cry to the Germans : ' Surrender ! ' 

"They answer: ' Throw down your arms. We 
have surrounded you and you are all prisoners/ 

"Wild with rage we throw ourselves forward 
with the bayonet, pushing the enemy back along 
the trenches. 

"In their holes the Germans cry, peering into 
the impenetrable darkness: 'Help! Don't fire! 
Bayonet them!' 

"Hundreds of shouts answer them, like a wave 
rolling in on us from every hand. 

"'Oh, little brothers, their force is numberless. 
We are surrounded on three sides. Would it not 
be better to surrender?' cries someone with a 
sob. 

"'Crack him over the head! Pull out his 
tongue! Drive him to the Germans with the 
bayonet!' are the growling comments this evokes. 

"A command rings out, vibrating like a cord: 
'Rear ranks, wheel, fire, fire!' 

"The crowd before us yells, moves, and seems 
to stop. But behind them new ranks groan and 



TRAPPED A GERMAN BATTALION 245 

approach. Anew the command is given: 'Fire, 
fire!' 

" Cries and groans answer the fusillade and a 
hand-to-hand struggle along the trenches ensues. 

" German shouts are heard: 'Help! Here, this 
way ! Fall on their backs ! ' 

"But it is we who fall on their backs. We pry 
them out and clear the trenches. 

"In front of us all is quiet. On the right we 
hear the Germans struggling, growling, repeating 
the commands of the officers: * Vorwdrts ! Vor- 
wdrts !' But nobody fires and nobody attacks 
our trenches. We fire in the general direction of 
the German voices; infrequent shots far apart 
answer us. The commands of ' Vorwdrts ' have 
stopped. They are at the foot of the trenches, 
but they do not storm them. 

'After them with the bayonet!' our men cry. 
'Finish them, as we finished the others!' 

'"Halt, boys!' calls the sharp, vibrating voice 
of our commander. 'This may be only another 
German trick. They don't come on. We are 
firing and they do not answer. Shoot farther and 
lower. Fire!' 



246 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

"New cries and groans come from the Germans, 
followed by isolated shots, which fly high above 
us. After five or six rounds silence settles upon 
the trenches and continues unbroken. ' What can 
this mean?' wonder our men. 'Have we exter- 
minated them?' 

"' Excellency, permit me to go and feel round/ 

offers S , chief scout, already decorated with 

the Cross of St. George. 

"'Wait, I am going to look into it myself.' 

"The officer lights a little electric lamp and pru- 
dently sticks his arm above the rampart. The 
light does not draw a single shot. We peer 
cautiously over and see, almost within reach of our 
hands, the Germans lying in ranks, piled on top 
of one another. 

"'Excellency/ the soldiers marvel, 'they are 
all dead. They don't move, or are they pre- 
tending? ' 

"The officer raises himself and directs the rays 
from his lamp on the heaps. We see that they 
are buried in the snow up to the waist or to the 
neck, but none of them moves. The officer throws 
the light right and left, and shows us hundreds 



TRAPPED A GERMAN BATTALION 247 

of Germans extended, their fallen rifles sticking 
up in the snow like planted things. 

" 'I don't understand,' he mutters. 

" 'Excellency, I am going to see/ says the chief 
scout. 

"'Go on/ the officer consents, 'and you, boys, 
have your rifles ready and fire at anything sus- 
picious without waiting for orders from me.' 

"S gets out of the trench and immediately 

disappears, swallowed by the soft snow up to the 
neck. He tries to get one leg out but without 
success. He tries to lean on one hand, pushes it 
down into the snow, then pulls hard and swears. 
His hands are frightfully scratched; the blood 
tinges the snow with dark blotches. 

"'It's the barbed-wire defences/ he cries. 
Help me, little brothers. Alone, I can do noth- 
ing.' 

"We catch him by the collar of his tunic and with 
difficulty pull him out. His coat, trousers, boots, 
are in shreds. 

"'Thousand devils!' he swears. 'I have no 
legs left. They're scratched to pieces.' 

"The officer understands. The trenches are 



248 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

defended by intrenchments of barbed wire. The 
snow had covered and piled high above them. 
The whole battalion we had seen had rushed 
forward to the help of those who had called and 
had got mixed up in the wires. The first over 
had sunk in the snow and disappeared. Those 
coming over had stepped on them, passed on, 
become entangled in the covered wires, and had 
fallen in turn under our hail of lead. Rank on 
rank, ignorant of what had happened and rushing 
on like wild animals, had shared the fate of their 
comrades. So perished a whole battalion." 



DROVE INTO HIS FOE IN MID-AIR 

AMONG the many daring exploits under- 
/ % taken by intrepid French aviators is a 
-*- -^ sensational, as well as a scientific, aerial 
coup accomplished by Lieutenant Jean Chaput. 
While above Montzeville in March, 1916, he 
gave battle to a German machine much better 
armed and more powerful than his own. Sud- 
denly, after an exchange of shots, the German 
dashed down upon him in order to crush him. 

It appeared, according to Victor Forbin, who 
related the incident in Les Annates of Paris, that 
Chaput had foreseen the occasion when he might 
be forced to approach an enemy in order to "get 
inside of him," according to the familiar phrase. 
He had declared that he would escape alive from 
such a dangerous approach. He had his plan, 
which he put into practice. 

Putting his motor at full speed, Chaput threw 
himself into the meeting with the German, and 

249 



250 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

then, at the moment of approach, moved his 
levers and manoeuvred his machine in such a 
manner that his screw tore into the enemy's 
fuselage (the body of the machine), cutting off the 
rear end. The German pilot fell whirling with his 
machine, which burst into flame, while his pas- 
senger went crashing into the ground nearly two 
miles below. 

The conqueror got back to earth by volplaning 
on his seriously damaged plane. 



FATE OF THE FLAME THROWERS 

A FRENCH correspondent on the Somme 

I % front obtained this glimpse of one of the 

-*- ^ most thoroughly modern horrors of war 

from an injured soldier in a first-aid station near 

the advanced trenches : 

"It was decided to withdraw us to a better posi- 
tion, some fifty yards in the rear. Then the 
captain called for someone to stay behind to 
watch and signal the enemy's movements. That's 
my regular job, so I fixed myself about fifteen feet 
up in the cleft of a big tree and seized a telephone 
which was connected with the nearest battery. 
From there I could see a German trench at the 
edge of a little wood about eighty yards from 
the trench my comrades had vacated. 

"For nearly an hour nothing happened. Occa- 
sionally I noticed heads peering from the Boche 
trench trying to see into the empty trench, which 
was hidden from them by a slight swelling of the 

251 



252 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

ground just before it. They would have been a 
splendid mark for a sniper, but I had other work 
this time. Suddenly a group of about forty 
Boches crept forward from the wood, rapidly 
followed by the best part of a company. I 
telephoned: ' Enemy advancing, led by a de- 
tachment of " Flamenwerfer" ',' for I had recognized 
the devilish apparatus carried by the foremost 
group. When the latter were about eighty feet 
from the empty trench they halted in a hollow 
just below the rise in the ground, and then with 
appalling suddenness, a dozen jets of white and 
yellow flames darted up to fall plumb into the 
trench. The dense smoke hid the rest of the 
Germans, but, thanks to my mask, I was able to 
gasp information to the battery. 

"It was then I had a glimpse of what hell must 
be like. Our gunners had the range to an inch, 
and a torrent of shells burst right among the fire- 
throwers. Great sheets of flame sprang up, one 
jet from an exploding container just grazing me, 
burning my clothes and scorching my ribs rather 
badly. But it was impossible to escape. The 
ground was a sea of fire. In the midst of it the 



FATE OF THE FLAME THROWERS 253 

Germans, like living torches, were dying horribly. 
One man spun round like a top, not even trying 
to run away, until he fell in a pool of flame. Others 
rolled on the ground, but the blazing liquid ran 
round them everywhere, and I could smell the 
horrible odor of burning flesh. 

"I don't think any fire- throwers escaped. Their 
screams, heard despite the cannonade and rifle 
fire, seemed to continue horribly long. The 
company behind them seemed panic-stricken. As 
the smoke lifted I saw them running back to the 
wood, and our mitrailleuses did severe execution. 
"X was nearly fainting with the fumes and pain 
from my burns. The captain sent a patrol, which 
found me hanging limply to the tree fork. They 
had trouble getting me, but luckily the Germans 
were too staggered to interfere.,, 



BOMBING FROM AN ARMORED CAR 

jk DOZEN leather-clad officers — French and 

I A English — rushed out of a farmhouse, 
-*- *• followed by a score of soldiers hurriedly 
adjusting goggles. A few rods down the road six 
armored motor cars were waiting; a minute later 
&ve of them were humming, while four men, besides 
the driver, piled into each car, disappearing 
through little doors cut in the rear, immediately 
under the Maxims, which peeped out a few inches 
from the half-inch steel plating. 

The sixth car stood motionless, and a British 
captain hailed a lieutenant who stood holding 
desultory converse with a correspondent of the 
New York Tribune. 

"Here, lieutenant, you take the last car; you 
drive, don't you?" 

The lieutenant did not. But the captain did 
not wait to learn; he crawled into his steel cage, 
slammed the door after him, and was off. 

254 



BOMBING FROM AN ARMORED CAR 255 

A command was a command; but the lieutenant 
could not obey this one. He looked sheepish, 
swore, became downcast, and spoke pathetically 
of ruined chances. The correspondent, who could 
drive, saved the situation for him by acting as 
chauffeur to the armored car, a role which enabled 
him to record its exploits, and off it darted in the 
wake of the other five. It was a Mercedes, taken 
from the Germans and refitted. 

"Between jolts," wrote this correspondent, "I 
listened to the lieutenant's explanation. It seemed 
that German armored cars were playing havoc 
in half a dozen villages north of us, between La 
Bassee and Armentieres, making their raids at 
most unexpected hours, working their quick-firers, 
two to each car, against every living thing in sight 
— soldiers, inhabitants, and even cattle. One 
of them the other day (the period is early in 191 5) 
had bumped at full speed against a chain drawn 
tight across the road, and another junk pile had 
been added to the many lining the roads in 
this region. But those left were bolder than 
ever, raiding villages fifteen miles out of their 
lines, and as they had been reported leaving Lille 



256 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

by one of our aviators, we were going after 
them. 

"The lieutenant watched the road with his 
glasses. Suddenly he cried: 

" 'That's one, sure. I can see their wire-cutters! 
Let her rip!' 

"The correspondent, who had heroism thrust 
on him and wrote as though he quaked under the 
ordeal, drove down the road, rushing to meet a 
distant gray streak that at once stopped, turned, 
and fled before them. Bouncing and plunging, 
the British car followed, in a frantic endeavor to 
overcome the intervening distance in the six or 
seven miles that lay between the German car and 
the German lines. 

"Through the narrow main and only street of 

F we pounded, the speed-indicator registering 

forty-five miles, and as the few half-burned farms 
rushed by us, the black faces of African troopers 
appeared cautiously at doors and windows, while 
threatening guns were lowered as the tricolored 
bands painted on our steel box flashed by. At 
times, as gutters were crossed, the wheels, rising 
in the air, fell back with a crash, while springs 



BOMBING FROM AN ARMORED CAR 257 

groaned and creaked, and the men behind clinging 
to the sides were jerked bodily to the floor. The 
lieutenant sat on the floor of the car, a box of 
hand-grenades between his legs, arms clasped 
lovingly around it, and I remembered wondering 
at the courage of the man — a Liverpool clerk, 
used to dull office routine — rising to a heroic level 
at the first emergency. 

"Immediately out of the village we saw the 
Germans five hundred yards in front, just at the 
crest of the hill, which we climbed after them 
without changing the gear. They were going 
their limit evidently, while we still had another 
five-mile increase in our motor, and I gave it out. 
The car leaped forward just as the German mi- 
trailleuse spoke. Two or three light shocks against 
the sloping armored front, and we veered over to 
the side of the road, going nearly into the ditch 
as the wheels skidded over the mud. 

"Our Maxims were useless to us, and no one 
thought of using rifles at such a speed. Our only 
hope lay in overtaking the car ahead and praying 
that the tires, our only exposed parts-, would hold. 

"Taster!' yelled the lieu tenant. 



258 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

"I ignored him, getting out of the Mercedes all 
she had in her with the load she was carrying, and 
anyway we were now within a hundred yards of the 
German, and her quick-firer was beating a tattoo 
against the steel shield in front of me. 

" Seventy-five yards more! — sixty — forty ! — and 
the German swerved from side to side, intent on 
keeping us behind him. Being so close our tires were 
safe, the firing angle being too great for the 
mitrailleuses in front, and as for ourselves nothing 
but a shell could penetrate the half-inch steel 
plate; the bullets glanced upward harmlessly 
from the sloping fronts. 

"Bending close to me, eyes glued on the slit 
(the aperture through which the road was seen), 
the lieutenant said: 

"'Now's the time. When you see my arm fly 
past, put on the brakes — hard. Stop as short as 
you know how, for the fellow in front is going to 
stop shorter still. . . .' 

"A smell of burning tinder came to my nostrils 
along with a warning cry of 'Look sharp' from 
the lieutenant. And so, more through intuition, 
I felt his arm flash over my head, my whole weight 



BOMBING FROM AN ARMORED CAR 259 

was thrown on brake and clutch pedals, while 
the motor, released, turned crazily. 

" The three grenades, dragging their short fuses, 
timed at five seconds, sailed true to their goal 
over and in front of the onrushing Germans. I 
was too busy straightening my own car (which 
skidding from behind, leaped across the full width 
of the road at nearly a right angle) to notice ex- 
actly what occurred, but when we brought up 
hard against a pile of crushed stone, which Provi- 
dence had miraculously placed between us and 
the ditch, the German car, not ten feet away, was 
just ending a l whirl of death ' act and landing on 
its side, both front wheels smashed from under it. 

"Out of the tangle we pulled five men. One, 
the driver, his breast crushed by the steering 
wheel, was dead. Among the four others were 
broken arms and collar-bones. 

"Bandaged and congratulated on their brave 
efforts against us, the Germans — two officers of the 
Landwehr and their men — were still ignorant of 
what had put them out of the race. Their sorrow 
at not having first thought of this new mode of 
automobile warfare was intense. 



2 6o SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

"A can of gasolene was spilled over the pile of 
junk, the mitrailleuses were hammered into shape- 
less masses, and a match applied. The van- 
quished armored car ended in a blaze, while its 
former occupants returned with us — prisoners." 



THEY FELL, BUT THE FUSE WAS 
LIGHTED* 

ABRIDGE had to be blown up and the 
whole place was an inferno of mitrailleuse 
L and rifle fire. Into this pandemonium 
went the British Royal Engineers. A spectator 
of the scene, M. Darina, a singer from the Comedie 
Franchise, who had joined the Cuirassiers, de- 
scribed their exploits: 

"A party of them rushed toward the bridge, and 
though dropping one by one, were able to lay the 
charge before all were sacrificed. For a moment 
we waited. Then others came. Down toward 
the bridge they crept, seeking what cover they 
could in their eagerness to get near enough to light 
the fuse. 

"Ah! It was then that we Frenchmen wit- 
nessed something we shall never forget. One man 
dashed forward to his task in the open, only to fall 

^Copyright by McBride Nast 6* Co. 
261 



262 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

dead. Another, and another, and another fol- 
lowed him, only to fall like his comrade, and not till 
the twelfth man had reached the fuse did the at- 
tack succeed. As the bridge blew up with a 
mighty roar, we looked and saw that the twelfth 
man had also sacrificed his life." (From "Tommy 
Atkins at War," by James A. Kilpatrick.) 



THE BAPTISM OF LEAD 

HOW a French soldier, going into action 
for the first time, faced the great ordeal 
that had to be met by every man who 
participated in the greatest of world conflicts (the 
battle described dates from the early days of the 
war), is thus told by him: 

" For some time the rattling of volleys has been 
audible. Then at a distance a heavy detonation 
of a gun is heard. Arrived at the crest, we drop 
down, and there, right in front of us, on the oppo- 
site hills, and making for the plains between, are 
the enemy, engaged in a fight with a division of 
the Allied troops. 

"I can distinctly see the German artillerymen 
moving about the guns on the hilltops and slopes. 
I see a mighty flash from one of the guns ; the heavy 
report is reechoed by the surrounding hills. It 
is strange, but in the face of death and destruction, 

I catch myself trying to make out where the shell 

263 



264 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

has fallen, as if I am an interested spectator at a 
rifle competition. I am not the only one. I see 
many curious faces around me bearing expressions 
full of interest, just as if the owners of the respec- 
tive faces formed the audience at a highly enter- 
taining theatrical performance without having any- 
thing to do with the play itself. 

"The human mind is a curious and complicated 
thing. Now that we are shooting at the enemy 
I hear — as often afterward, in the midst of a first 
battle, I heard — some remark made or some funny 
expression used which proved that the speaker's 
thoughts were far from realizing the terrible facts 
around him. It has nothing to do with heart- 
lessness or anything like that. I don't know what 
it is. 

"Volley after volley was sent in the direction 
of the enemy. The German shells and bullets 
passed over our heads. The Germans may 
be, and are, our superiors in executing parade- 
steps but they are infernally bad shots. 

"A rain of hostile bullets passed over our heads. 
Instinctively we stopped, although when one hears 
the bullet it has passed already. It is a queer 



THE BAPTISM OF LEAD 265 

sensation which comes over us the first time we 
are met with a hail of bullets. We suddenly 
feel as if attacked by fever, but this feeling soon 
leaves us. 

"The earth was shaken by the incessant cannon- 
ading, and the air was torn by continuous rattling 
rifle fire. A comrade on my right stumbled, 
dropped forward without uttering a sound, killed 
by a shot in the breast. A man in front of me 
threw his arms up, struggled to his feet, and fell 
again. 

"A shell exploded near us, followed by a terrible 
cry. Five of our number were lying dead in a 
little square. One man had both legs blown away 
and was still alive — conscious, and imploring us 
to kill him. An officer ran past, stopped, 
and after a short look, shot him through the heart. 
'Ca vaut niieux,' he said, ' pauvre diable /' 

"The officer opened his lips to utter a command 
and at the same moment got a bullet through his 
mouth. He turned around twice and fell heavily 
on the dike close by me. 

"We are retreating. Our men display a re- 
markable self-control. Notwithstanding the ap- 



266 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

palling scenes around me, I, too, feel perfectly 
calm now. Terrible though it may seem, I confess 
that without a moment's trouble I aim at my living 
targets, shoot, and watch the effect of my bullet." 



IN A FRENCH COTTAGE 

THE Prussians had occupied the French 
village of Lourches, near Douchy. A 
German officer there insulted the wife of a 
miner in her cottage, in a corner of which a French 
non-commissioned officer, wounded by a fragment 
of shell, was lying on a rough couch. 

The soldier, in a frenzy of indignation, killed the 
officer with his revolver. He was seized and Ger- 
man troops made ready to shoot him. 

At that moment a French lad, Emile Despres, 
aged fourteen, entered the cottage, and the con- 
demned man asked him for a drink of water. The 
lad gave him water and was immediately brutally 
beaten. Then his eyes were bandaged, and he was 
placed beside his countryman for execution. 

The German officer in charge, however, sud- 
denly changed his mind, and taking the handker- 
chief from the boy's eyes, put a gun into his hands 

and told him he would spare his life if he would 

267 



268 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

shoot the non-commissioned officer. The boy took 
the rifle, levelled it as though to present it at the 
condemned man, and then, turning suddenly, 
shot dead the officer. He was immediately 
transfixed with bayonets and riddled with bullets. 
The non-commissioned officer shared his fate. 

Thus was the story related by a French senator, 
M. Pauliat, of the Departement du Cher, who 
vouched for its accuracy, and published by the 
Pall Mall Gazette. 



THE SOLITARY GUNNER BROKE THE 
COLUMN 

THERE was a party of 150 Highlanders that 
were detailed to hold a bridge over the 
Aisne," said a British engineer in describ- 
ing some hard fighting near Soissons to G. Ward 
Price, of the London Daily Mail. "A German 
attack was not expected at that point, and the de- 
tachment was meant to act rather as a guard than 
as a force to defend the bridge. 

"Suddenly, however, the Germans opened fire 
from the woods around, and a strong force — out- 
numbering the little body of Highlanders by large 
odds — came forward at a run toward the bridge. 
The Highlanders opened fire at once, and for a 
time held the enemy at bay. But the numbers 
of the Germans were so great that the attack- 
ing force crept constantly nearer, and a dense 
column of troops was seen advancing, under 

cover of a heavy fire, along the road that led to 

269 



270 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

the river. Then one of the Highlanders jumped 
from cover. 

"The Maxim gun belonging to the little force 
had ceased its fire, for the whole of its crew had 
been killed, and the gun stood there on its tripod, 
silent, amid a ring of dead bodies. The High- 
lander ran forward under the bullet storm, seized 
the Maxim, swung it, tripod and all, on his back, 
and carried it at a run across the exposed bridge to 
the far side, facing the German attack. 

■ ■ The belt of the gun was still charged, and there, 
absolutely alone, the soldier sat down in full view 
of the enemy and opened a hail of bullets upon the 
advancing column. Under the tempest of fire 
the column wavered and then broke, fleeing for 
cover to the fields on either side of the road, 
and leaving scores of dead that the stammering 
Maxim had mowed down. 

"Almost the next moment the Highlander fell 
dead beside his gun there in the open road. But 
he had checked the advance upon the open bridge, 
and before the German column could again form 
there was the welcome sound of British words of 
command from the rear of the little force of High- 



GUNNER BROKE THE COLUMN 271 

landers, and reinforcements came doubling up to 
line the river bank in such numbers that the Ger- 
mans soon retired and gave up the attempt to 
gain the bridge. But the Highlander who had 
carried forward the Maxim gun to his post of 
certain death there in the open road, had thirty 
bullet wounds in his body when he was picked up." 



THE MESSAGE THAT SAVED A REGIMENT 

IN A DISTANT and exposed position on the 
western front a British regiment was in 
danger of annihilation, and a message had to 
be sent ordering its retirement. This could only 
be accomplished by despatching a messenger, and 
the Irish Fusiliers were asked for a volunteer. 
(From "Tommy Atkins at War.") 

Every man offered himself, though all knew 
what it meant to cross that stretch of open country 
raked with rifle fire. 

They tossed for the honor. The first man to 
start off with the message was an awkward, shock- 
headed chap who, the narrator said, did not. im- 
press one by his appearance. Into the blinding 
hail of bullets he dashed, and cleared the first 
hundred yards without mishap. In the second 
lap he fell wounded, but struggled to his feet and 
rushed on till he was hit a second time and col- 
lapsed. 

272 



THE MESSAGE SAVED A REGIMENT 273 

One man rushed to his assistance and another to 
bear the message. The former reached the 
wounded man and started to carry him in, but, 
when nearing the trenches and their cheering 
comrades, both fell dead. 

The third man by this time had got well on his 
way, and was almost within reach of the en- 
dangered regiment when he, too, was hit. Half 
a dozen men ran out to bring him in, and the whole 
lot of the rescuing party were shot down; but the 
wounded Fusilier managed to crawl to the trenches 
and deliver the order. The threatened regiment 
then fell back in safety. 



HIS CAPTOR WAS MISSING 

A BRITISH aviator had been obliged to 
descend within the German lines, and was 
made prisoner by a German officer. The 
latter, revolver in hand, made his prisoner take 
him in his airplane for a flight above the Allied 
lines in order to make observations. Having 
seen sufficient, the officer of the Kaiser ordered 
the aviator to turn his machine. In order to do so, 
the airplane mounted higher and suddenly turned 
over in an admirable loop. On righting himself 
the pilot found he was alone, the German officer 
having been insufficiently strapped in. The avia- 
tor descended as quickly as possible into the 
British lines. 

He had, of course, tumbled his captor out. It 
was a new method of evading capture, as novel, 
in fact, as the circumstance of conducting a 
flight as the prisoner of a German officer, and his 

achievement earned the young aviator a decoration. 

274 



RODE THROUGH LYDDITE AND MELIN- 
ITE 

CHARGING a battery of eleven German 
guns was a feat undertaken by the 9th 
Lancers at Toulin in order to save a 
British infantry division and some guns. 

Onlookers described their charge as another 
Balaclava. They rode at the guns like men in- 
spired. Lyddite and melinite swept like hail 
across the thin line of horsemen. When they got 
close to the German guns they found themselves 
riding full tilt into hidden wire entanglements — 
seven strands of barbed wire. Horses and men 
came down in a heap and few who reached this 
barrier ever returned. 

"We rode absolutely into death,'' a corporal of 
the regiment wrote home (Printed in "Tommy 
Atkins at War"), "and the colonel told us that 
onlookers never expected a single Lancer to come 
back. About four hundred charged and seventy- 

275 



276 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

two rallied afterward, but during the week two 
hundred more turned up wounded and other- 
wise. You see, the infantry of ours were in a fix 
and no guns but four could be got round, so the 
general ordered two squadrons of the 9th to charge, 
as a sacrifice, to save the position. The order was 
given. Not only did A and B squadrons gallop 
into line, but C squadron also wheeled and came 
up with a roar. It was magnificent, but horrible. 
The regiment was swept away before one thousand 
yards was covered, and at two hundred yards from 
the guns I was practically alone — myself, three 
privates, and an officer of our squadron. On the 
colonel's signal we wheeled to a flank and rode 
back. I was mad with rage, a feeling I cannot 
describe. But we had drawn their fire; the in- 
fantry were saved." 



TWENTY-SIX BRITISH FOUGHT THREE 
THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED GERMANS 

DURING the early stages of the fighting in 
Belgium a small British force encountered 
an overwhelming body of German troops. 
The action that followed was witnessed by the 
Belgian army staff, according to a Belgian soldier, 
who wrote this account of the engagement to a 
friend in South Wales : 

"It happened after the different battles which 
resulted in the evacuation of Mons. The British- 
ers, who had fought like heroes, must have re- 
treated with reluctance — in obedience, it is true, 
to orders received from the military authorities. 
As they were only giving ground step by step, 
twenty-six Fusiliers entrenched themselves in a 
farm overlooking the long, straight road leading to 
Quaregnon. They were in possession of several 

mitrailleuses, and they made holes in the farm 

277 



278 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

door, three lines in three holes in superposition, 
and placed their mitrailleuses into position. 

"'Now, boys/ shouted one of the twenty-six, 
'we are going to cinematograph the gray devils 
when they come along. This is going to be 
Coronation Day. Let each of us take as many 
pictures as possible/ 

"As soon as the Germans appeared on the road 
and started attacking the canal bridge, the 
Fusiliers very coolly turned the handles of their 
deadly guns, commencing with the lower tier, and 
with the same placidity as a bioscope operator 
would have shown. 

"The picture witnessed from the farm on the 
'living screen ' by the canal bridge was one that will 
not easily be forgotten. The 'gray devils/ as the 
Germans are now commonly called, dropped down 
in hundreds. In a few minutes the corpses were 
heaping up. Then followed another onslaught by 
the mitrailleuses placed against the upper part of 
the door, followed immediately by a fresh deadly 
sweep and by another one. 

"The Germans, however, found out their 
difficult position which exposed them to this 



TWENTY-SIX BRITISH FOUGHT 279 

destructive fire, and they resolutely took a turning 
move and made straight for the farm. When they 
got there they found neither guns nor Fusiliers, 
but only an opening in a party wall, through which 
the lucky operators had disappeared with their 
apparatus. 

"There was nothing left for the Germans but to 
continue their march along the road, which gets 
narrower just before entering the village. They 
had not gone more than two hundred yards before 
a fresh rain of lead, which was kept going for a long 
time, mowed them down like grass, and in still 
more considerable numbers than at the first fight. 
With a wild rush, the remainder of the Germans 
stormed the door of the new farm which sheltered 
the enemy, but found only the mitrailleuses, 
deliberately put out of order. As for the twenty- 
six heroes, they had disappeared like a conjuror's 
rabbit, to rejoin their regiment, without having 
sustained the slightest injury, after having routed 
three thousand five hundred Germans. " 



A TUB FORTRESS OVERCAME THE 
UHLANS 

DOZENS, perhaps hundreds of men were 
cut adrift from their regiments during the 
great British retreat from Mons in the 
early days of war — adrift and hopelessly lost in a 
strange country. Major A. Corbett Smith, in his 
"Retreat from Mons," recounts one incident which 
he cites as an instance of individuality in the 
training of the British soldier: 

"A man — we will call him Headlam — got adrift 
by himself from the Third Division out on the left 
flank. After many hours' wandering he came to a 
little farmhouse by the road. Here the good 
woman took him in, fed him, and gave him a shake- 
down. There were also there a couple of French 
stragglers. 

" A few hours later the little son of the farm came 

running in with the news that a patrol of the 

280 



FORTRESS OVERCAME UHLANS 281 

dreaded Uhlans was coming down the road. That 
meant murder for everyone. There was no time 
to hide, and the Frenchmen were at their wits' 
end. 

" Headlam's first thought was for cover. Out in 
the yard there was a big rain-tub. Calling the two 
French soldiers to help, they rolled it out length- 
wise on into the road, and one of them and Head- 
lam got behind it with their rifles. The moment 
the patrol appeared, Headlam gave the Uhlan 
an excellent example of rapid fire, and three sad- 
dles were empty before they realized where the 
attack came from. Then they charged. French 
and British, side by side, ground away with their 
rifles, and when the Uhlans reached the little 
fortress there were only three left out of the patrol 
of nine. The second Frenchman, by the side of 
the road, accounted for another, and, with three to 
two, the Uhlans surrendered. 

" So our three musketeers found themselves with 
five excellent horses and a couple of prisoners; and I 
leave you to picture the triumphal procession 
which passed through the villages on the south- 
ward journey. The order of march was: (1) 



282 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

Jacques and a led horse, (2) Pierre and a led horse, 
(3) two disconsolate Uhlans on foot (and hating it), 
and (4) Headlam (with female escort) as G. 0. C, 
bringing up the rear." 



FRIEND AND FOE BOMBED THIS LONE 
SOLDIER* 

IN THE woodland fighting which marked the 
Battles of the Somme, a youthful English 
soldier survived a trying ordeal — that of 
being repeatedly bombed in a dugout. As told 
by Philip Gibbs, in his "Battle of the Somme/' he 
went with the first rush of men into Mametz Wood, 
but was left behind in the dugout when they re- 
tired before a violent counter-attack. 

Some German soldiers passed this hole where the 
boy lay crouched and flung a bomb down on the 
off-chance that an English soldier might be there. 
It burst on the lower steps and wounded the lonely 
boy in the dark corner. 

He lay there a day listening to the crash of 
shells through the trees overhead — English shell- 
fire — not daring to come out. Then in the night 

*Copyright, George H. Doran Co. 

283 



284 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

he heard the voices of his own countrymen, and he 
shouted loudly. 

But as the English soldiers passed they threw a 
bomb into the dugout, and the boy was wounded 
again. He lay there another day, and the gunfire 
began all over again, and lasted until the Germans 
came back. Another German soldier saw the old 
hole and threw a bomb down, as a safe thing to do, 
and the boy received his third wound. 

He lay in the darkness one more day, not expect- 
ing to live, but still alive, still eager to live and see 
the light again. If only the English would come 
again and rescue him! 

He prayed for them to come. And when they 
came, capturing the wood completely, finally one 
of them, seeing the entrance to the dugout and 
tliinking Germans might be hiding there, threw a 
bomb down — and the boy was wounded for the 
fourth time. This time his cries were heard, and 
the monotonous repetition of his ill-luck was 
ended. 



SAVING A WOUNDED MAN AND A GUN 

THE Germans had rushed forward in close 
formation, clouds of them, toward the 
centre of a front line of trenches held by 
a battalion of the Yorkshire Light Infantry. It 
was a critical day at the war's beginning, in Aug- 
ust, 1 9 14, when the brigade to which the battalion 
was attached had to retire toward Le Cateau, near 
Mons, after a day and night of hard fighting. 
There they held their ground waiting for French 
reinforcements; but none came. 

There was no holding the position in face of the 
forced withdrawal of regiments on the right and 
left of the centre. Finally, at half-past four in the 
afternoon, came the order to retire. 

A non-commissioned officer of the retiring 
battalion, Corporal Frederick William Holmes, 
thus describes to Walter Wood, in the latter's 
"Soldiers' Stories of the War" (Chapman & Hall, 

28s 



286 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

London), what befell him in the resulting confu- 
sion: 

"Things had been bad before; they were almost 
hopeless now, for to retire meant to show ourselves 
in the open and become targets for the German 
infantry; but our sole chance of salvation was to 
hurry away — there was no thought of surrender. 

"When the order was given there was only one 
thing to do — jump out of the trenches and make a 
rush. This we did; but as soon as we were seen 
a storm of bullets struck down most of the men. 

"At such a time it is ' Every man for himself,' 
and it is hardly possible to think of anything except 
your own skin. All I wanted to do was to obey 
orders and get out of the trench and away from it. 

"I had rushed about half-a-dozen yards when 
I felt a curious tug at my foot. I looked to see 
what was the matter and found that my boot had 
been clutched by a poor chap who was wounded 
and was lying on the ground unable to move. 

" 'For God's sake save me!' he cried, and before 
I knew what was happening I had got hold of 
him and slung him across my back. 

."I had not gone far before the poor chap com- 



SAVING A WOUNDED MAN 287 

plained that my equipment hurt him and begged 
me to get it out of his way. The only thing to 
be done was to drop the equipment altogether; 
so I halted and somehow got the pack and the 
rest of it off, and I let my rifle go, too, for the weight 
of the lot, with the weight of the man, was more 
than I could tackle. 

"I picked up my man again, and had struggled 
on for twenty or thirty yards when I had to stop 
for a rest. 

"Just then I saw the major of the company, 
who asked : ( What's the matter with him? ' 

"I could not speak so I pointed to the man's 
knees, which had been shot with shrapnel. The 
major then answered: 'All right; take him 
as far as you can, and I hope you will get him 
safely out of it.' 

"I picked him up again and off I went, making 
straight for the hill at the back of the position 
we had taken, so that he should be safe from the 
German fire. The point I wanted to reach was 
about a mile away, and it was a dreadful journey; 
but I managed to do it, and when, after many 
rests, I got there, I started to carry my man 



288 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

to the nearest village, which was some dis- 
tance farther. 

"I got to the village, but the German heavy 
shells were dropping so fast that I could not stay 
there. They told me to carry him to the next 
village. I was pretty well worn out by this time, 
but I started again. At last, with a thankful 
heart, I reached the second village and got the 
man into a house where wounded were being 
kept. 

"How far did I carry him? Well, it was 
calculated that the distance was three miles. 

"Having put my man in safety, I left the house 
and began to go back to the position, expecting 
to find some of the regiments to rejoin, but when 
I reached the firing line there were no regiments 
left. They had been forced to retire, and the 
ground was covered by the dead and wounded; 
it had been impossible to bring all the wounded 
away. 

"There was a road at this particular spot, and 
on reaching the top of it I saw the Germans ad- 
vancing about five hundred yards away. Between 
them and myself there was a field gun, with the 



SAVING A WOUNDED MAN 289 

horses hooked in, ready to move off; but I saw 
that there was only a wounded trumpeter with it. 

"I rushed up to him and shouted: ' What's 
wrong? ' 

"'I'm hurt/ he said. 'The gun has to be got 
away; but there's nobody left to take it.' 

"I looked all around and saw that there were 
no English gunners left — there were only the 
Germans swarming up a few hundred yards away 
and badly wanting to get at the gun. There was 
not a second to lose. 

"'Come on,' I said, and with that I hoisted 
the trumpeter into the saddle of the near wheel 
horse, and, clambering, myself, into the saddle of 
the lead horse we got the gun going and made a 
dash up the hill. 

"There was only the one road, and this was so 
littered up and fenced about with wire entangle- 
ments that we could not hope to escape by it. 
Our only chance was by dashing at the hill, and 
this we did — and a terrible business it was, because 
we were forced to gallop the gun over the dead 
bodies of our own men; mostly artillerymen, they 
were. Many of the poor chaps had crawled away 



290 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

from their battery and had died on the hillside 
or on the road. 

"We kept on, over the hill, and when the Ger- 
mans saw what we were doing they rained shells 
and bullets on us. One or two of the horses were 
hit, and a bullet knocked my cap off and took a 
piece of skin off my head. But at the moment 
that didn't hurt me much, nor did another bullet 
which went through my coat. Once over the 
hill, we kept just driving straight ahead, for we 
couldn't steer, not even to avoid the dead. 

"I daresay the bullet that carried off my cap 
stunned me a bit; at any rate, I didn't remember 
very much after that, for the time being; all I 
know is that we galloped madly along, and dashed 
through two or three villages. There was no one 
in the first village; but in the second I saw an old 
lady sitting outside a house, with two buckets of 
water, from which soldiers were drinking. She 
was rocking to and fro, with her head between her 
hands, a pitiful sight. Shells were dropping all 
around and the place was a wreck. 

" I carried on at full stretch for about ten miles, 
tearing along to catch up to the rear of the column. 



SAVING A WOUNDED MAN 291 

I don't remember that I ever looked back; but 
I took it that the trumpeter was still in the saddle 
of the wheel horse. 

"At last I caught up with the column. Then 
I looked round for the trumpeter, but he was not 
there, and I did not know what had become of 
him. That was the first I knew of the fact that 
I had been driving the gun myself. 

"Of course I never thought of saying anything 
about what I had done; but I was sent for and 
asked if it was true. I said I had got the man 
away and helped to take the gun off, and this was 
confirmed by the major who had seen me carrying 
the man. 

"For the day's work at Le Cateau two Victoria 
Crosses were given to men of my regiment — one 
to myself." 



THE FIRST AMERICAN SHOT 

IT WAS fired from the steamship Mongolia 
at a German submarine on April 19, 191 7. 
The story, as told by Lieutenant Bruce R. 
Ware, U.S.N., who commanded the gun crew of 
the steamship, is as follows: 

"At 5.21 the chief officer walked out on the 
port side. The captain and myself were on our 
heels looking out through the port. I saw the 
chief officer turn around, and you could have seen 
the whole ocean written in his face, and his mouth 
that wide (indicating), and he could not get it out. 
Finally he ejaculated: 'My God! look at that 
submarine !' The captain, gripping my arm, 
replied: 

"'What is that?' 

"'It is a submarine, and he has got us!' I said. 

"I followed the captain out on the bridge and 

I looked at my gun crews. They were all agape. 

292 



THE FIRST AMERICAN SHOT 293 

The look-out, too, were all agape. I threw in my 
starboard control and I said: 

" 'Captain, zigzag ! ' 

"I did not tell him which way to go. We had 
that all doped out. The captain starboarded 
his helm, the ship turned to port, and we 
charged at the U-boat and made him go under. 
I went up on top of the chart house with my 
'phones on, and I had a long, powerful glass, 
ten power. Right underneath it I always lashed 
my transmitter, so that where I went my 
transmitter went also, and I did not have to 
worry or hunt for it; it was always plugged in. 
I said: 

"'No. 3 gun, after gun, train on the starboard 
quarter, and when you see a submarine and 
periscope or conning tower, report.' 

"The gun crew reported control: 'We see it; 
no, no — it has gone. There it is again.' 

"I picked it up at that moment with my high- 
powered glass, and I gave them the range — 1,000 
yards, scale 50. She was about eight hundred 
yards away from us. I gave the order: 

"'No. 3 gun, fire; commence firing.' 



294 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

"I had my glasses on then and I saw that peri- 
scope come up. 

"'No. 3 gun, commence firing; fire, fire, fire!' 
"And they did, and I picked that shell right 
up as it came out of the gun — a black, six-inch 
explosive shell. I saw it go through the air in its 
flight, and I saw it strike the water eight inches — 
a foot — in front of that periscope and it went into 
the conning tower; I saw that periscope go end 
over end, whipping through that water; I saw 
plates go off his conning tower, and I saw smoke 
all over the scene where we had hit the enemy/ * 



THE RESCUE FROM THE DEEP 

IT WAS in the course of the naval battle off 
Heligoland on August 28, 1914, when the 
British fleet dashed out into enemy waters, 
sank two German cruisers and other craft, and 
left a third battleship on fire and in a sinking con- 
dition. One of the British vessels, the Defender, 
having sunk an enemy, lowered a whaler to pick 
up her swimming survivors. But before the whaler 
got back an enemy's cruiser came up and chased 
the Defender, which was thus forced to abandon 
her whaler. 

The situation of the men on board the whaler 
can be imagined — adrift in an open boat without 
food, twenty-five miles from the nearest land, 
and that land the enemy's fortress, with nothing 
but fogs and foes round them. Suddenly a swirl 
stirred the waters alongside the boat and out of 
the deep emerged His Britannic Majesty's Sub- 
marine E 4. The conning tower flew open; the 

295 



296 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

whaler's company were taken on board; the con- 
ning tower shut up again; the submarine dived, 
and brought them home — 250 miles. 

" Is it not magnificent ! " wrote a naval lieutenant 
in describing the incident to a friend. 

"No novelist would dare face the critics with 
an episode like that in it, except perhaps Jules 
Verne; and all true!" 



HOW A STOWAWAY BESTED THE COURT- 
MARTIAL 

THERE was a young Australian in Egypt 
where the Anzac troops were sent from 
Gallipoli," wrote Charles W. ^Whitehair 
in the American Magazine. "Everyone knows 
of that superb and terrible campaign at Gallipoli. 
One would think that the men who had lived 
through that hell would have been glad of the 
comparatively peaceful time they were having in 
Egypt. 

"But not they! They were soon fed up with it 
and wanted to get back where they could see action. 
This young chap was a country boy, used to free- 
dom, unused to discipline. He stowed away on a 
troopship, hoping to get over to France to fight. 
But he was discovered after the ship sailed and 
was returned from France. 

"Technically, he was a deserter. His motive, 

of course, did not excuse his act, and he was court- 

297 



298 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

martialed and sentenced. While he was under 
guard, the Turks attacked. Every man was 
needed to repel them and he was left without 
guard. He had no arms, of course. And he had no 
right to leave the place where he was, anyway. 

"But he did. He went out and began bringing 
in the wounded under fire. As he was carrying 
in the fifteenth man, he was killed by a stray 
bullet. His colonel told the story, and said he 
had been jecommended for the Distinguished 
Conduct medal. When asked about the court- 
martial matter, the colonel naively answered: 

" 'Somehow we lost those papers.' " 



THE CHARGE OF THE DEAD 

THE Irish Fusiliers were to charge the 
enemy's position that night. While they 
waited for the word, the enemy's artillery 
broke out in response to the British salvos. The 
shells screamed through the air and instinctively 
the men crouched for shelter in the trenches. 

The enemy's guns at last found the range. 
Here and there a shell burst, almost on top of the 
trench, sending the earth flying and half burying 
the men in the vicinity. 

A big, youthful six-foot Irishman occupied a 
position near the centre of the line. Next him 
was a smaller man from Ayrshire. Farther on was 
another stalwart from Belfast. 

At last the signal to charge was given. The 

men bounded out of the trenches, their bayonets 

levelled, and made a headlong rush for the enemy's 

position some one hundred and fifty yards away. 

The three comrades advanced abreast. A shell 
299 



3 oo SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

screamed through the air. It passed and left 
the Belfast man headless. His two companions 
instantly saw what had happened; but the momen- 
tum of the charge carried them on, and the head- 
less Fusilier charged with them. 

The grim horror of a headless body, rifle and 
bayonet still held in position, ran on, step for step, 
along with the others, for a distance of some 
fifteen yards, before it collapsed and fell a huddled 
heap on the ground. 

The incident was described by the big Irishman 
to James W. Herries a British war correspondent, 
who, in narrating it in his "Tales from the 
Trenches," made this comment thereon: 

"Many members of the hospital staffs, to whom 
I have told the story, have found it not at all 
surprising. The muscular action continuing after 
the control of the brain had been removed, and the 
general circumstances in which the incident oc- 
curred, fully account for what happened. From 
my knowledge of the Irishman, and his complete 
want of the imaginative faculty, I can personally 
vouch for his cr edibility.' ' [This ends Herries's 
story.] 



THE CHARGE OF THE DEAD 301 

A similar incident marked the retirement of the 
British from Mons before the German advance on 
Paris. A trooper is the narrator: 

a The Germans let all hell loose on us in their 
mad attempt to crush us and so win their way to 
Paris. They didn't succeed. I saw one ghastly 
affair. A German cavalry division was pursuing 
our retiring infantry when we were let loose on 
them. When they saw us coming they turned 
and tied, at least all but one, who came rushing 
at us with his lance at the charge. I caught hold 
of his horse, which was half mad with terror, 
and my chum was going to run the rider through 
when he noticed the awful glaze in his eyes and 
we saw that the poor devil was dead." 

Like men alert and eager stood a number of 
troops whom Basil Clarke, the war correspondent, 
observed at the foot of a slope newly taken from 
the Germans. Round it ran barbed wire, a thick 
mass of it, and many feet deep. Mr. Clarke, in 
"My Round of the War" (William Heinemann, 
London) thus described their bearing: 

"By the wire stood soldiers with rifles and fixed 
bayonets. They were leaning forward thrusting 



3 o2 SNAPSHOTS OF VALOR 

out their bayonets as though to repel someone 
coming through the fire, though from above we 
could see no one was approaching it. One of 
them was without his shrapnel helmet, which lay- 
near him on the ground. He did not pick it up. 

"I watched them for a time and was struck 
by this fact, that they never moved, but stood 
stock still with their bayonets ever outstretched 
before them, their bodies leaning slightly forward. 
It looked like some numbered position in bayonet 
drill. 

" 'What are those men there? ' I asked my guide. 
'Are they drilling or what? They have been 
standing there without moving for ever so long. 
Their instructor seems to be keeping them at it.' 

" 'No, they're not drilling/ he replied quietly. 
'They are Walk up and look.' 

"I walked down the slope a little way till I 
could see them more clearly. 

"They were dead. Shot as they had run down 
the slope and right on to the enemy's wire. Their 
bayonets and rifles had got between the wire; and, 
trapped there, their bodies were leaning forward 
against its barbs. The wire was holding them up. " 



NOT DEAD, BUT DEAD-DRUNK 

DURING an air fight with a Hun machine, 
a British pilot was surprised to find no 
answering salvo from the rear of the ma- 
chine. It was an extraordinarily simple matter 
to force the enemy to the ground, and when the 
British gathered round to capture the crew, they 
found the observer curled up under his gun. 
Imagining him to be already a corpse, they were 
discussing the best means of removing him when 
they were surprised by a series of violent snores 
proceeding from the direction of the — supposed — 
dead man. 

They found him to be hopelessly intoxicated, 
and, on learning that he was a prisoner, he cursed 
his pilot volubly for not making for the German 
lines again. Even the fact that he had broken 
all records for air fighting did not tend to soothe 
his ruffled vanity. (" Glorious Exploits of the 
Air" by Edgar Middle ton, Appleton.) 

303 




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